We all know that college can be, to say the least, stressful. As a pre-med student, I happen to find that most of my exams tend to fall within the same week. (Likely because my professors enjoy watching us suffer, but that’s beside the point.) Since a young age, I always found stress relief in re-reading and re-watching the Harry Potter series. For me, Harry Potter allows an escape, and sometimes battling Voldemort seems easier than tackling a med-micro, genetics, communication, and a chemistry exam all in one week. In the week before my second round of exam-craziness, I decided to examine all of the gifs and pictures of Harry Potter I had on my laptop and relate them to my upcoming week.
Many of us have the same experiences throughout Exam Week- particularly:
What you look like at the beginning of exam week:
What you look like in the middle of exam week:
What you look like by the end of exam week:
Basically, the end of exam week leaves you feeling emotionally and physically drained.
When your professor assigns a lengthy homework assignment the week of an exam:
Seriously, this is an issue. I have to write a ten page paper, do three assignments AND prepare for your 75 question exam? Please stop.
When the teacher keeps adding on to their list of what will be on the exam:
No student needs MORE topics to study- we can barely handle the stress of the exam we were preparing for.
Professor: "This won't be on the exam, but you should think about..."
For some reason, a lot of professors decide that the day before the exam is the perfect time to give a lecture on a new topic, or a topic that has absolutely no correlation to the subject matter, instead of further preparing you.
When you've been studying for hours and still don't understand what you're working on:
I know that this gif comes from Potter Puppet Pals instead of the Harry Potter franchise, but I felt as though this perfectly encapsulates the feeling after your fifth hour at Ellis Library, still trying to do well on the provided practice tests that likely have no relation to the test given.
The look the smartest kid in the class gives you when you ask a question:
Please be nice to your fellow students, even when they ask a question that may seem obvious. You probably have questions they think are dumb as well.
When the aforementioned smartest kid decides to make sure you know how dumb they thought the question was:
When you get to the hall on the day of the exam and recognize NO ONE:
For some reason, many college students don't attend the lecture and just show up for the tests. As someone who only misses class for illness, walking into a class that usually has 60 students and finding 400 on exam day is a tad unsettling.
When you're done with your first exam and remember you have more:
It feels good to be done with at least one, but remembering you have more to come is almost more stressful than the exam itself.
When you sit down and are completely lost before you've even answered the first question:
When you exit the exam hall in a negative mood:
Sometimes exams are so tough you end up feeling like you knew LESS than when you came in.
When you exit the exam hall in a positive mood:
When you get your exam back and you did worse than you expected:
Sometimes it just happens.
When you get your exam back and you did better than you expected:
When one person gets 100%, screws up the curve, and you have to pretend that you're not resentful:
FINALLY:
Although weeks that are full of exams can be filled with a lot of stress, remember that with hard work and dedication, you won't need Felix Felicis to get a good score. Remember, that no matter what happens, you can always do better next time, and that at the end of the week, you can celebrate in knowing you won't have more exams for at least two-three weeks.
