Oh, college – a period of very little free time, lots of coffee and alcohol, and copious amounts of studying.
Every college student knows that the shining pupil you are at the beginning of the semester is not the same person as the sleep-deprived, brain-dead corpse that crawls out of the classroom after the last final of the year. Whether it's just the fear of adulthood or something totally different, we just keep coming back for more. Sure enough, we find ourselves up in the front row of the classroom at the beginning of the next semester. For those of you scraping up the energy to get through the last few weeks of school, here are the stages of the spring semester that we know and love so well, as told by "The Office."
The semester is just starting and you have a beautifully organized planner, pens in five different colors, and you're determined to get that 4.0.
For a solid week or two, you write down every word your professor says so as to not miss anything when test time rolls around.
You decide to make a pact to not skip class unless absolutely necessary and force yourself to stick with it.
When tuition is due and you have finally sold your entire life away.
When your professor brings up extra credit opportunities and you know you're gonna need to cash them in later.
Then, it is the second or third week of school and you realize that maybe your "never skip class" policy was a little bit unrealistic.
When the "Last Chance for Withdrawal" date arrives and you have to decide whether or not to drop your hardest class.
When the mid-semester blues hit because you're ready for summer but it's February.
The two weeks before spring break.
The week after spring break.
The three weeks or so afterwards that you marinate in your post-break hangover and just decide that you should have withdrawn from the class when you had a chance.
When you've got to start putting in some serious effort to get your GPA up and you magically turn into a star student, then you wonder why you haven't been working this hard the whole freaking semester.
Dead week.
Finals.
When you finish your last final and the semester is over.
In all seriousness, education is a huge blessing and one that should not be taken for granted. Still, college is a privilege that comes with a huge amount of stress and frustration towards the end of the year.
You may have started the semester dressed to the nines and jotting down your to-do lists in a leather-bound agenda but ended the semester writing down due dates on a napkin while wearing a literal pair of pajamas. Even so, you made it through in one piece, and that is something to celebrate. Here's to the end of the semester!
