Sierra Magenau

Tam sophomore Dominic “Dom” Daher

The month of December brings students many things from the holidays of Christmas and Hanukkah, to spending time with family and friends, but worst of all: finals. Every high school or college student deals with the dread and anticipation of seven big tests all in one week that sometimes take weeks of studying to prepare for. 

All of a sudden you have to try to study for your history, math, science, and English classes all at once and hope that this final won’t tank your grade. However, at the same time, you want to enjoy the one month you get of the holidays during December. So should finals really be the week before Christmas at Tamalpais High School?

Students may feel that by having finals one week earlier, like most college students have, they would get to enjoy the holiday season,hang out with friends and participate in holiday activities. It would be the most beneficial to all the students who work so hard for almost three months and are pining for a break. 

Especially since many Tam students take almost four Advanced Placement (AP) courses on average, it would help reduce the stress and make it easier for them to relax for a longer period of time. 

Grace Duncan, a junior at Tam, believes that it would be beneficial for students to complete their finals earlier. Duncan expressed that she was under a lot of stress for her finals and found that when some teachers would make theirs the week before, she got to enjoy the holidays.

She also says the lead up and anticipation of finals is one of the worst parts and can psych her out. “Actually leading up to it, you get more [anticipation for it] and it becomes more stressful,” Duncan stated. 

Another junior at Tam, Jada Evilsizer, stated that she found the same stress when it came to finals week and that she wished it was earlier, such as on a typical college calendar. “I was very busy and felt like I missed out on fun activities for Christmas,” Evilsizer said.

However, Evilsizer also stated that she felt she got more time to study which helped lessen the stress during her finals. 

“I was staying up late and studying a lot, which is needed, but I felt like it overstressed [me] and then when it actually came time to take my finals, I didn’t stress as much,” stated Evilsizer. 

However, Yocelyn Baquiax, a junior at Tam said she wouldn’t like finals to be earlier. She said that if finals were a week earlier, that time would get added on somewhere else in the year and she doesn’t want that. “I believe that finals should not be a week earlier because it would cause an increase in school days throughout the year,” Baquiax stated. 

Being able to move finals forward one week so it would be between Dec. 8 and Dec.12 could help students be allowed to enjoy December and hang out with their friends and participate in festivities. It takes the burden of studying all the way through typically Dec. 20, which would allow students to take a much needed time of rest after working for three months. 

Even though it would add more time overall to the rest of the year, it could be beneficial for students who need a break from school after three months of hard work. It would allow students to spend more time with family and friends during the busy holiday season.