Finals week is approaching rapidly. I feel as if I am on a high speed train with no brakes and heading right towards an incomplete bridge suspended over a canyon (like in one of those western films), that I will inevitably fall off. My stress stems from a few sources right now. Obviously with impending large tests and essays due in the next week I am feeling the pressure. However I have come to realize it is not solely due to the fact that I have these tests. It is coming from my lack of knowing where I stand in several of my classes. For example in my chemistry and psychology classes the teachers regularly update the course grade book on iLearn. I have a 95% in chemistry and a 91% in psychology, but in my HCOM 214 and my Sociology 100 class I have no idea what my grades are therefore I don't know how to handle the rest of the semester. Even in my Sociology class we have regular weekly assignments that I have gotten A's on every week, so with that knowledge I can infer my grade is most likely an A, but in HCOM I have absolutely no idea where I stand. Am I failing, as in having less than a 75% in the class, because if that's the case do I even need to do the final essay or am I just going to fail no matter what? Or do I have an A+ and I shouldn't be stressing as much because I will most likely be able to maintain that grade over the next week? Having received low B's on the last two presentations has got me concerned because I and my group thoroughly believe we did A work and since our A equals our professors B-, I am even more unsure what to expect with my final grade.
I think a lot of this intrapersonal conflict inside me also stems from my impending transfer. This fall I am leaving CSUMB, and attending a Junior College and then my ultimate goal is to transfer to UC Berkley, but do you think Berkley accepts students who get B's in freshman English? No, surely not one of the most competitive schools in the state does not accept mediocrity. I have been living with the stress of my performance academically for the entire semester and now with the end in sight I wonder if I have allowed my dreams to slip through my fingers. This feeling of failure only serves to further my stress about where I will go and what is my back up plan? I am ready for the summer because I feel as if I am going to explode with stress if I don't get a break soon.
Actually writing this has served to be very therapeutic and I feel better now that I have vented my anger a little bit, a more organized stress vs. the original chaotic stress. But it is not relief enough having final grades in iLearn will be my only release from this ball of stress I have wound myself into.
I can definitely relate to how you're feeling with your grades and transferring and stuff. I am actually doing the same thing. I'm going to a junior college next year in hopes of going to UC Santa Barbara after that. So I know what it feels like to be stressed about mediocrity. It is true, by the way, that writing all of this is therapeutic.
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