Students Share Thoughts For Midterms

By Anna Kim, Aveen Burney, Lauren Kim, Anvi Bhate, Ariana Thornton

As midterms approached, campus bustled with mixed feelings of anxiety, relief, and hope. While many students have adapted to the new schedule with ease, others have struggled to balance schoolwork with sports and extracurricular activities. Many new and returning students shared their overall experiences with their workload this term. 

Returning students noted their increase in workload. “My [academic] workload has very much increased this year,” upper Vera Aimunmondion said, “And while I'm keeping my commitments as little as possible, I still have a huge workload compared to last year from classes and the PSAT.”

Lower Nick Li agreed. “It’s harder than prep year, not because of the differences the school makes, but rather because I'm doing more extracurriculars compared to prep year.

“Some days it's more manageable than others,” upper Yoeku Sam said. “It definitely has increased since my lower year and I don’t think that it’s too bad. But if you have good time management, I think you could get most things done.”

Seniors have also been busy with college applications, “I feel like this term is slightly better than last year because my courses are more interesting. However, it is challenging balancing college applications with my academic workload,” senior Hope Flowers said.

“This term has definitely been harder than last year,” senior Ryan Kim said. “But it’s nice knowing that we’re almost done with the whole process.”

For students involved in athletics, balancing homework and sports practices has been a challenge. “Field hockey takes up a lot of my time because it's from 4:00 to 6:30 p.m. every day, so it’s a little bit hard for me to complete all my schoolwork with those two hours gone,” upper Sadie Shang said.

New students noted their workloads as well. “It’s kind of been what I expected,” prep Valentina Martinez said. “But just a tiny bit more work. It’s manageable when I use my time wisely.”

New upper Hunter Ryerson shared similar sentiments. “It took me a while to even figure out if there was any pattern at all to it [the schedule], which is just sort of being new, but I like the way classes won’t always be 8 a.m. [classes],” Ryerson said. “But the schedule seems good so far and I like the way it sort of shifts throughout the week in a sort of rhythmic pattern.”

“I don't know what my expectations were because I just knew that anything would be a hike from where I came from to Exeter,” Ryerson continued. “I think it's manageable, but my sleep schedule has definitely suffered in a way that it hasn't before.”

Students offered suggestions for ways to improve the academic schedule. In terms of the short block homework policy, “I think it's more annoying than last year because we have to have homework for every block, versus time off last year, but you kind of get used to it after a while,” Li said. However, according to Sam, short block assignments, however, take less time.

“Most of my teachers are really good at planning assignments during short blocks. Usually, homework during short blocks isn't that bad, and it gives students time to review,” upper Sangye Sherpa agreed.

Despite less homework, some students still find the workload too much. “I felt that it was really hard for me to get around,” Shang said. “I usually have four to five classes every day because most of my classes use reserve, and I know I need to do four or five classes of homework every night.”

Lower Aimunmondion would prefer returning to no-homework short blocks. “It’d make things easier for me, not having five hours or so of homework every day. Short blocks without homework were very helpful, though I know it's a complicated subject because we have to be mindful of teachers’ curriculum.”

Students touched on their upcoming preparations before midterm grades are released. “I think I am prepared for midterms but I definitely need to study more,” Martinez said. “The teachers [crammed] assignments, trying to prepare us for midterms,” Martinez continued.

“With midterms approaching, I think my workload is definitely ramping up, but that’s to be expected as you get further into the school year,” Ryerson said. “I don’t know if it’s specifically midterms themselves, because I don't have anything else to compare them to, but so far, it’s still manageable—I’m just dealing with it day by day.”

Other students note fewer major assignments in light of midterms. “Most of my teachers aren’t assigning too many major assignments for midterms, and I am hopeful for my midterm grades,” upper Sam Pangan said.

Aimunmondion concluded with some guidance. “I would say teachers are individually assigning the same amount of homework as before, but altogether I am just having bigger assignments grouped closer together. When you have five consecutive assignments due every day of the week, it can become pretty stressful. Prioritizing time management and planning is always super important, and it can help workload become less overwhelming overall.”