I was under the impression that this year would be relatively easy, and yet the six classes that I have to take mean I’m busier than ever. What infuriates me more than the fact that I was misled about senior year, is that because of North Carolina’s 22-credit graduation requirement, I technically only have to take two classes to graduate. However, instead of taking the two classes that I need to, I have to take six and made my seventh a free period. Other seniors, depending on if they took a free period and if they started high school math freshman year, only need three to four classes to graduate. Either way, it’s fewer than the six to seven that we have to take.
While a few extra classes senior year might not seem like a major problem, the work that comes with those extra classes builds up and leads to students having less time to do anything other than homework after school. Many seniors are applying to college, some have jobs and they do extracurriculars, like clubs and sports, on top of their homework. These activities accumulate, and they frequently lead to students staying up remarkably late to try to complete everything. Rather than having to take six to seven classes, seniors should have
the option to in the morning take the two, three or four classes that we need to graduate and then use the afternoon for a job or an internship.
Giving seniors this option would give us the ability to gain real- world experience at a job or internship without having to squeeze it in the late afternoon or during the weekends. By having fewer classes we would have less homework which would provide us with more time. This extra time would benefit college applications, the number of extracurriculars we have, and it would lead to more sleep.
