I don't know about you, but finals week is upon us here at Pitt-Johnstown! If yours isn't here yet, it will be soon, and you've likely already fallen into the Finals Week Struggle (TM):
1. Figuring out your finals schedule.
2. Thinking, "That's not so bad..."
3. Studying and thinking, "See, I can do this..."
4. ...while also thinking, "There is no way I am not failing this exam."
5. Avoiding studying anymore because the stress is too much.
6. Repeat.
Everyone I've talked to in the last few weeks has said the same thing: "I'm freaking out for finals, I have to get such-and-such grade to keep my grade in the class, and I have to write X-number of papers and take X-number of exams...", all with the look of a deer caught in the headlights from sheer panic. I'm guilty of it myself, I'll admit it - I've gone to counseling because school makes me so anxious. Too often I get caught up in the finals week hype. And all for what? The pursuit of a "good" number between zero and four?
What is a GPA, really?
Of course, a GPA is a mathematical way to determine how well you're doing in college in terms of your grades. Your GPA defines a lot of things in college: if you'll graduate with honors, if you keep a scholarship, if you win an award, or maybe if you get to take certain classes.
But there's also a whole lot your GPA does not define.
Your GPA could never show how hard you worked in that one class you took with that really hard professor, where you worked your butt off to do some of your best work, only to still get a C. Your GPA will never show how you took a whole night you could've been spending studying just to be with your best friend after her grandfather died and she was hours from home and her family. Your GPA doesn't factor in the hours you spent doing extracurriculars and community service and a million other things that have bettered you as a person, even if they didn't necessarily help your grades.
All of these things define you as a person. These things show that you are taking these formative college years to grow into an incredible young adult who is preparing themselves to go out into the real world. These are the things that matter.
I'm not staying don't study every again because studying doesn't mater. Studying still matters, and it still determines your scholarships and if you can graduate and all that other stuff. You should still work to get the best grades that you can get. What I am saying is that if you fall short of your GPA goal, pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and get ready for the next test, next paper, next semester. Learn from every failure, because there is value in failure as well. Your GPA defines a lot of things, but it is not the end-all and be-all of who you are as a human being.
So this finals week, study hard, but also let yourself breathe. We've got this. And if we don't? There's always next semester.
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