As the first quarter of a new year ends, students feel pressure to wrap everything up. But there are some students that are struggling to “wrap up” because their workload feels like it never ends. Those students are in their junior year. 

Junior year is infamously known as “hell year” — a time of immense stress and work for high school students. 

During junior year, students not only have to keep up with more AP class work, they have to start seriously thinking about college. 

Students begin to look at their extracurriculars as resume builders, instead of hobbies. While they try to do 10,000 things to look good for a specific college, the fun of life gets lost. 

Aki Pantisidis, senior, said, “I definitely heard that people always thought junior year is the hardest — it’s going to be stressful, you’re going to be focusing on college stuff, harder classes, more clubs — all that was true.” 

To fulfill those “college expectations” students have to be overly involved in extracurriculars. While this may be a good thing, additional extracurriculars get in the way of regular school work, self-care, and rest. 

Chloe Fulk, junior, is one of the many students that are drowning in her work load. Fulk plays two varsity sports — Basketball and Cross Country — and is a member of three Leesville clubs — National Honor Society, Math Honor Society, and Environmental club. 

Fulk said, “[This year is] the first time I’ve been on the verge of B’s… it’s a new experience. You want to join clubs and all the activities so you’re losing time to do your homework and focus on the other things… It’s definitely pressure because colleges are looking for that.” 

During junior year, there is a fine line between an academic slump, and being burned out. 

An academic slump is a period of reduced motivation, productivity, and overall performance in school. More often than not, it happens during specific times of the year — October/November, after Christmas break, and after Prom in April.

An academic slump can come from pressure, boring classes, repetitive work, and an overall feeling of being overwhelmed. 

Burnout is a prolonged feeling of mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion. Burnout can be caused by excessive and chronic stress, leading to feeling overwhelmed and unmotivated. Students that get burned out feel a sense of helplessness — too much to do, not enough drive to do it all. 

A survey was given to 64 Leesville juniors. 20% said they were in an academic slump and 68% said they were burned out. While only 16% said they were “ready to take on second quarter.” 88% of students are struggling with academic stress. 

Isabel Snyder, junior, is currently enrolled in three AP classes — Calculus, AP Language, and AP Computer Science Principles. She is involved in many clubs including National Honor Society, Math Honor Society, Rho Kappa, Liaisons, SpeakHER, Special Needs Awareness Club, and Varsity Tennis.  

Snyder said, “I am burned out… the amount of AP classes, clubs, afterschool activities, sports, and I’m taking on more leadership positions, overall it is causing me more stress which makes me want to put off more stuff. It’s making me feel mediocre at everything.

Junior year burnout can look different for each student. Some fall behind on assignments, get lower grades, or stop participating in as many social events. 

Snyder said, “I used to have a very strong sense of urgency to get my assignments done before they were due, but now I have more missing assignments. I don’t care as much about how I do on tests because I know some of them, I just won’t do well, whereas freshman and sophomore year I tried more.”

Fulk said, “I just need to get my work done and get through it. “ 

Between late night AP US History readings, finishing articles, or compelling an AP Environmental Science google form, there are endless assignments for the junior class to be working on. 

There is an expectation on juniors to do the most because their peers are, and college admission offices need to see a description of a bustling extracurricular schedule. 

Mary-Bradely Dalton, junior and currently enrolled in three AP classes — Calculus, US History, and Psychology. She is a part of the Leesville Dance Team, a year round sport, and dances at Carolina Dance Center. 

Dalton said, “[Junior year] is actually really hard so far. You are trying to prepare for college and colleges care about your scores.”

Part of the “hell year” is figuring out how to balance work and self-care. 

Snyder said, “I don’t have as much time. Even if I want to have more social things going on, I always have to put academics over what I’m doing because there are always things that need to get done… I don’t have a regular eating schedule anymore. I eat as much or as little as I can when I can. There are some nights that I stay up and I drink Celsius and I don’t get that much sleep.” 

As I was writing this article, I fell asleep with my computer open. I woke up the next morning more concerned about not finishing my work, and a dead computer that needed to be charged for 1st period,  rather than reflecting on the fact that I finally went to sleep before midnight. Many times this is the case for junior year students — work will always preside over a normal routine, leading to burnout. 

Even though it is hard, junior year is not impossible. To beat junior burnout, students must learn time management.

Pantisisids said, “I would try to finish as much as I could while school was happening and then I would try to focus and finish as much as much of my stuff as I can as soon as I got home from school because the longer I got into nighttime, I was less focused and I didn’t want to do as much schoolwork. Try to finish as fast as you can, so you can focus on the fun stuff later.”

Being organized can help deal with the seemingly overwhelming amount of work. A calendar, agenda, or to-do lists ensure that students get everything done while making it look manageable. 

My Apple Iphone calendar has every task I must complete in a week. It is color coordinated because there are so many events that I have to use colors to differentiate the events. Green events are school related, purple events are sports, and blue events are social events. 

Utilizing resources to stay organized is a quick way to make the stress of junior year seem manageable. It will be a year that presents challenges, but forces students to mature. 

Pantisisids said, “The harder classes made me learn how to study better and that obviously prepares you for the classes you take in college because you need to study more for college. 

The organizational skills and just the balancing of everything is just really really helpful for life.” 

But for now, juniors just have to get through it.