I think it's typical for every college student to stress out for any test but especially midterms and finals week.

If you do bad on a midterm it's easy for you to work hard on your grade and recover in the class but if you do bad on a final exam (which exams that are cumulative are the worst) then your goal is to probably pass with a C in the class.

Remember: C's get degrees.

One of my best and worst qualities about myself is my drive for success. I constantly think about my to-do list and I'm not satisfied until it's done, and I know that I have done my best. For my finals week this semester of my Junior year, I had a lot to do but I chose to focus only on one thing at a time and then start working on the next. For example, I had an 8-minute Spanish presentation due the Friday before finals week, so I worked and prepared for that up until Friday. When that was over my next big goal was my nutrition final on Tuesday morning, so I would prepare all weekend and Monday for that. When nutrition was done, I focused solely on Spanish for the exam Friday.

Focusing on one test at a time helped me a lot because it's hard for me to multi-task and study different subjects but I also didn't take the time I needed in between each test to recover after I had taken it.

Nutrition was a huge struggle for me throughout this entire semester. The professor taught the course like it was pre-med and the only reason that I had signed up for this class was that it said "intro to nutrition" but honestly it was way more advanced than I would have thought. On Monday I studied nutrition from 9 am to 9 pm (including breaks, obviously, but not long ones) but I thought I was going to go insane. I spent most of my time that day just writing specific topics that I needed to look over or important things that I think would be on the test. I prepared so much for this final that I wasn't watching my mental health and I ended up not getting a good nights' sleep for an 8 am final. I constantly thought of topics and I did my best to remember a lot of the information and do the recall method. I drove myself crazy, and I honestly didn't need to.

College finals are hard, but so are any tests during the semester. For some reason, there's a huge stigma on midterms week and finals week because we're told that "This is the worst time of the semester. Your grade is going to plummet if you do terrible. Study in advance."

Finals week is definitely a time for stress and long study hours, but actually, your mental health is important all semester long. For any test, no matter the subject I always seem to overwork myself and do everything in my power to feel prepared enough for the test and then if I get the grade back and I didn't get the grade I wanted, I'm disappointed with myself because I felt like there was something more that I could have done. And yes, I know that sounds crazy but it's true. I'm not alone on this when I say that when college students get a bad grade on something, it upsets us; because it actually does. And if it doesn't upset you then I think you're doing something wrong.

As college students I'm pretty sure that we're all here doing this education thing for a reason, we all have greater purposes in life and we have goals that we want to achieve.

We should not be defined by a test or a number to understand a concept. Our experiences and knowledge should stand alone, and test scores should not matter. Students shouldn't have to risk their sanity for the sake of a GPA but more often times than not, that's exactly what we do. So if you know someone who constantly worries about school or is stressing out, give them a big hug and tell them how great they're doing and how proud you are because they might just need a little reminder.