If you’re anything like me, a grade-obsessed nineteen-year-old in the midst of figuring out my future, you are no stranger to the hell on Earth that is exams. Weeks of stress and anxious minds, sleepless nights and baggy eyes, notebooks, flashcards, study groups galore. School is exhausting, the material is stressful, and mental health is nothing short of a lost cause. In this day and age, it’s easy to get manipulated into valuing the letter at the top of your exam over your mental health. After a sad trend has taken root in our generation, we need to be reminded of something that society has somehow forgotten long ago: your mental health is more important than your grades.

As a college sophomore in the midst of midterms, I understand firsthand the toll that academics can play on one’s mental health. I’ve suffered through the al- nighters. I’ve persevered through the tutoring sessions. I’ve trudged through the rain, snow, sleet and hail, all to put on a brave face during office hours, only to cringe my way through the study guide twenty minutes later. I understand the anxiety of counting your GPA down the ten-thousandth and I’ve shed more tears over my grades than I have for boys and friends and combined. I fully understand how crazy this sounds, but the unfortunate truth is that I’m not alone. Society has created a stigma that values grades over mental well-being, causing mental health to be compromised by academics.

Far too many students will be able to relate to my struggle of compromising my mental health for my grades, and while I’m not proud of the value I place on academics, I find little peace in my company. It is disturbing rather than comforting to know that I am not alone in this self-destructive path of jeopardizing my mental well-being for a number on a transcript. But this sickening state of compromise will only worsen without a serious change in the system.

Parents, remind your children that there is more to life than an exam score. After a less than impressive grade on my Italian test, I vented my anxiety to my mom through choking sobs. Fully anticipating a lecture on the importance of grades and the need to study more — because what else would society lead me to expect — I was both shocked and comforted by her response. “Calm down, paint a picture, and remind yourself how talented you are in areas other than Italian. This test isn’t going to matter in the long run.” This was exactly what I needed to hear. My mom’s response is the only thing that kept me from breaking down every time someone mentioned the word “Italian.” Make sure your children know that no single exam is going to define his or her life, and focusing on his or her talents is more important than dwelling on his or her weaknesses.

Teachers, it’s time to make a change. The modern education system is fatefully flawed, putting more value on the score on the top of the exam than the material learned. Months of learning lectures upon lectures of information, all crammed into a 50-question midterm and multiple essay final. These tests are inflicted with the intention of measuring knowledge and testing abilities, and while the intent is just, the execution is not. Value the material taught over the grade received, and emotional well-being of the student will work wonders for academics.

Students, stop stressing. Close the textbook, exit out of Quizlet, and put the flashcards down. Break out a good book and get a good night’s sleep, because you both need and deserve it. Of course, a generally ambitious student will have more opportunities than someone who works less, but at the end of the day your life is not ruled by your grades. One day, you’ll be living in an apartment in your favorite city cooking dinner for your best friends, not caring in the slightest that you failed your sophomore year astronomy exam. You’ll have a family and job and friends and hobbies and the hours upon hours of studying that you invested in your statistics midterm will all be for null. You’ll laugh at the tears you shed over your Composition final, as you rock being a soccer mom and helping your own children with their academic stresses. Despite popular belief, your future does not depend on your grades. A number or letter does not define your worth, and the effort to achieve should not put your mental health at risk.