Stavya Week 16: Looking Back on Junior Year

American High School, Rankings & Reviews - Homes.com

Photo from Google

I was told that junior year would be especially difficult and that most of my time would be spent doing homework or studying for tests (here is an article about it). I thought so too at the beginning of the year when I looked down at my schedule and saw multiple APs. Now that I look back at my junior year, however, I will not remember junior year for being rigorous and time-consuming but rather for how much I grew over the year and the new memories I made.

I admit that I did have to spend a significant portion of my time focusing on schoolwork, but instead of preventing me from doing other things, it made me realize that time is a privilege and that I would not always be able to expect to do whatever I wanted with it. I started to spend more quality time either by myself or with others, whether it involved biking to Coyote Hills on a trail, taking long drives with my brother, or spending more time with my family. I used a lot of my time to relax instead of grinding out homework and assignments as I used to do, and I realized that I was happier and more energized overall.


I also tried to spend more of my time interacting with other people and making new friends. I started to go out with my friends more often, whether it was playing sports with them, such as basketball or football, going out to Bombay Pizza House or nearby restaurants, or simply relaxing at the park. I met a lot of new people through school this year, not only through my classes but also through many of the school activities that I participated in. For example, I had a great time on the tennis team this year, where I was able to interact with a lot of the new freshmen and spend some quality time with the seniors who will no longer be there next year.


I will also remember junior year for allowing me to finally figure out what I would like to spend my life doing. I was always interested in STEM, but through the various clubs, competitions, and classes that I participated in this year, I think I now have a much clearer idea of what I want to pursue in the future. I hope all of you had a similar experience as I did this year, and I guess we’ll see what senior year has in store for all of us.

Comments

  1. Praghna May 22, 2024 at 9:15 PM

    Hi Stavya! Like you I had also been told that junior year "would be especially difficult" by many people including many of my friends and family. It's nice to see that you had the opportunity to grow over the year and make new memories because for me it was quite a tedious year due to pressures of school and extracurriculars. Personally I think that my best year for making amazing memories like you spoke of was my sophomore year when I got to dance in spirit week and such.
    I like that you mentioned of your realization of the privilege of time and how we would not alway have enough of it later on in life, this truly resonated with my high school journey these three years.
    I appreciate the short paragraph formatting of your blog because it is clear and effective for the readers to perceive while being engaged throughout. Thank you for sharing your memories from this year and for the great blog!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mansi, Week 14: Déjà Vu

Image
A familiar sound. A familiar smell. A familiar touch. A familiar sight, but you just can’t quite put your finger on what you’ve been reminded of. The kick? You know you’ve never actually experienced it before. In a few seconds that feeling will pass, and you’ll simply brush it off and move on with your day. But chances are, you’ve just had your taste of déjà vu .  Déjà vu, according to the Scientific American , is a French term meaning “already seen.” The feeling’s spontaneity, as the article continues, makes it incredibly difficult for the feeling to be studied further, but cognitive psychologist Anne Cleary attempted to recreate the feeling in subjects in her lab by putting them in a certain situation and using things like furniture to stimulate their memory and evoke déjà vu. While she was successful, psychologists wouldn’t only attribute actual experience to sparking the feeling—déjà vu can also be triggered by experiencing something that a person has never actually been throug...
Read more

Mansi, Week 10: How do Power outlets Work

Image
There are not many things I can name off the top of my head that particularly aggravate me, but I can confidently reveal that one is the dramatic wrestle with the power outlet in the wall at the dead of night. With my phone clinging onto life at 2%, it’s no laughable circumstance—I’m mindlessly jabbing my charger here and there as the walls of my once familiar room become uncharted waters in the darkness. The battle draws on as I strike again and again and again, each futile jab driving me past the bare thresholds of patience, and finally climaxes when I roll up my sleeves and pull out the trick from underneath: my phone’s flashlight. I act swiftly, before the flashlight can counterproductively drain the final stretch of charge, and plug the charger into the outlet in one clean, effortless swing. Not more than a second passes before my phone relaxes, its source of sustenance once again being replenished. War is over. amazon.com /Electrical-Sticker-Fake-Wall-Outlet After a similar bout ...
Read more

Pradhi, Week 14 - Camera Roll

Image
Monday, lunch. My friends constantly laugh and shout out about something funny that I did a few months ago.  Tuesday, after school. My parents and I recall a vacation we went on a few years ago.  Wednesday evening. I think to myself in my room about how much fun I had when I hung out with my friends at the beach that one time.  All these different events in my life cut down to one simple thing: my camera roll. Whenever I'm bored or just sitting around, I find myself scrolling through my old pictures. In fact, this is exactly what I was doing yesterday evening when I got home from school instead of immediately starting my homework.  It's so interesting how every piece of a memory that I've ever experienced, every single moment can be confined to just one app on a small rectangular device. But is it really that small? 13,369 photos and 1,038 videos can seem so miniature while casually scrolling.  image link I know what you're probably thinking. "Is your memory rea...
Read more