Students adjust to effects of grade transitions

Samo students have slowly grown accustomed to their new classes since the first bell rang on the morning of Aug. 22. While the incoming sophomores get their first taste of AP’s, juniors start school as upperclassmen and seniors are just one year away from completing their high school careers. Meanwhile, freshmen are just getting started with their four years and while they find freshman year harder than 8th grade, they haven’t been affected by the frustration of AP’s yet.Among the masses of students rushing to get to their classes on time is Dustin Morris (’18) who has just begun to adapt to his new routine as a junior.“It’s different,” Morris said. “It’s different than the transition to freshman year and the transition to sophomore year. It’s a lot more work. It’s all about time management, really.” Morris’s school days are extremely busy as he has to juggle three AP’s, music and a language.Meanwhile, Wyeth Levi (’18) is handling his transition into junior year more lightheartedly.“It’s not quite as bad as it was hyped up to be, but I also had a pretty bad sophomore year, so in comparison it’s a little bit better I guess,” Levi said. “It’s a lot of work and no sleep.”Levi is also taking challenging courses like AP English. To manage the heavy workload of this demanding class, he employs odd strategies.“I lie to myself and tell myself that an assignment is not due until another day,” Levi said. “However, being a junior has its advantages. For example, you get to be regarded as an upper classman and sometimes you get to do whatever you want.”Although there can be some perks to being a junior, there are also many downsides that are inevitable.“There are no advantages, there are only difficulties,” Morris said. “The most difficult thing to do is to maintain a positive mindset to keep going and doing the necessary work.”However, trying to stay afloat is often difficult with the overwhelming workload.“It’s like drowning in quicksand: the more you flail, the harder it is to survive.”The transition into sophomore year is seemingly less rigorous than the one into junior year, according to Shrayes Rahman (’19).“I haven’t been a sophomore for long, but so far it’s going well,” Rahman said. “I’m able to manage all the work. I think the transition from freshman to sophomore was way easier than from 8th grade to 9th grade because there was so much to get used to in high school.”Rahman is even looking forward to becoming a junior next year as he’s heard that sophomore is the hardest year of highschool.  The main challenge standing in front of the sophomores, juniors and seniors at Samohi is the AP testing. While there are still 8 months before the actual exams, students taking APs are looking forward to their end.“I think that once the [AP] exams are over, I’m just going to catch up on all the sleep I’ve missed on,” Morris said. Although most juniors seem pessimistic about their upcoming year, their grade transitions seem to have gone rather smoothly.As the days and the weeks form to soon make a month, the Samo students continue to get accustomed to their classes. Although they have to face tougher classes and larger workload, the students will continue to work hard.