By Rohan Keith Andreson ’12
THE ROUNDUP
The start of the second semester brought about a common ailment that senior teachers know all too well: senioritis.
I have heard this term and experienced it firsthand in some of my senior courses last year; however, this year, I am viewing it in a completely different light.
Though I am not prepared to fall short of my responsibilities, and as seniors we should all have a strong level of respect for our obligations, I have an understanding of the underlying ideas behind senioritis.
After spending three and a half years at Brophy, I understand why senior students feel the way they do; and it has no disrespect behind it.
I believe students are emotionally and mentally drained from the most exhaustive three years they have ever experienced.
Brophy students have pushed themselves, more than they have ever done, in the classroom, the sports field, the arts, the service field, and emotional, self-reflection.
A famous adage of the Jesuits is that “Jesuits ruin people.” What they mean is they introduce young, naïve men and women to the horrors and injustices of the world as well as their own inner truths.
Students at Brophy often explain their difficulty adjusting to normal life after spending a week in Guatemala or Puebla and express similar trouble in trying to overcome their “Kairos highs.”
In an accumulation of three and a half years of these sentiments, how can a Brophy senior devote all of his attention and focus to ordinary classroom activities?
I think this feat is impossible.
Counselor Ms. Karen Parise sees how students are affected by their day-to-day experiences at Brophy.
“I am oftentimes amazed at the depth and the breath of activities that these Brophy students are involved in—It is not really surprising that senioritis shows its ugly head from time to time,” Ms. Parise explained.
Brophy second-semester seniors are unique in what they have learned in the past four years.
They have been taught there is more to life and to living than simply going through the basics and living the mundane life of a high schooler.
So how are they expected to proceed “business-as-usual” after all they have soaked up?
They realize their time with their close-knit brotherhood is coming to a close, and franticly, they adjust their priorities in their life.
Schoolwork is no longer as important as their last few months of relationships with their closest friends before they part ways.
The accumulation of future plans, four years of nostalgia and the evanescent presence of your closest friends is enough to keep students from continuing focus on something as relatively unimportant as math problems and reading assignments.
“Keeping people of your age on the goal is difficult and requires balance,” Ms. Parise said.
The attitude that many people have for seniors is that they should continue “business as usual.”
To know that your time at your home of four years is coming to a close is, to say the least, frightening.
It is not practical for second semester seniors to be able to lock themselves in the Information Commons at lunch to finish homework or stay home from one of their last basketball games to study.
We should not lose our respect for our studies and our responsibilities. We are capable of doing our homework and studying for exams to the fullest of our abilities.
I believe, however, that sensitivity to the emotional and psychological state of second semester seniors is crucial, but there is a fine line between the natural anxiety and an excuse for laziness.
It is imperative that seniors not lose our respect for schoolwork but also that we live each of our last days to its fullest.
