"Average Sentinel Student" - My Thoughts on Academic Pressure at Sentinel

DISCLAIMER: I have done 0 research on this topic, this is purely based on my observations and my thoughts.

"Education" by artist Avocado 6

When I think of the average Sentinel Student, my mind goes to the image of a stressed kid, striving to achieve high grades, possibly taking several APs, who has likely planned out a direct path to a STEM career of their choice. Though you might think, "Isn't this how everyone is?" Sentinel is an exceptional case. Kids from other schools are different.

I once caught up with an old friend from White Rock. When I asked him what he wanted to do after high school, he said he wanted to go to BCIT and become an electrician. That was crazy to me. Sentinel is abound with prospective aerospace engineers, doctors, businesspeople, dreaming of going to a good Canadian university or an Ivy League. But I've never heard anyone from Sentinel say that they wanted to go to BCIT and become an electrician.

There is an image of success that people here are very aware of. High grades and lots of extracurricular involvement lead to admission to good schools, which leads to a stable job and money. This idea is encapsulated in 爬籐 or "pa teng", as my mother calls it. Meaning "ivy" in Chinese, it's all the things parents and their children do to climb up the ranks into an Ivy League school. Enrolling their kids in sports, SAT prep classes, all to achieve an award or something that will help boost their university application in the future. By accumulating prestige from a young age, their child will become well-established in society. Of course this mentality starts with the parents, but the kids perpetuate it as well.

We're all trying to win this game of university admissions.

You feel pushed to attain great things. You are ambitious; you feel you can do everything. Even more so, you feel like you have to because everyone else is doing it. It seems like everyone's taking an AP or more, or being involved in a bunch of extracurriculars. And if you aren't doing as much as everyone else is, you must be missing out on something crucial that will come back to bite you later down the road.

But a good friend once gave me a word of advice that I'll remember forever: "Do it out of love, not out of fear". Sure, not everything you'll do in life will be something youlove doing. But you can't let the pressure of university admissions engulf your entire person. You've got to get your head out of the game. At the end of the day, what makes life worthwhile is all the things you love doing. There's got to be something you keep by your side to remind you of what you live for. It's too easy to get lost and end up not caring—about yourself, about others, about life.

Sometimes I attend presentations by clubs about certain career paths. The thing is though, certain presenters gave me the impression that they themselves didn't see the appeal in those careers. Neither did the audience. I saw it in their eyes. They're all there, because they feel they have to and they've led themselves to believe they want to. Perhaps they would rather be doing something else, but they've never known what that something else is. Or they've learned that what they love doesn't help them climb to an Ivy, so they've cast it aside.

Here's another thing, from my personal experience: you can't do everything all at once without it taking a toll on you. I got involved in a little too many extracurriculars this year. I felt that if I didn't, I would be wasting all the opportunities around me. Plus, it was easy to compare myself with others who have even more hectic timetables and say that I can handle it. At one point this year, I was in R&B band (outside of my timetable), the Sentinel Sun, the Sentinel Political Journal, the Sentinel Asteria Journal, all while being a TedXSentinel speaker as well. I felt like a Lunar New Year firecracker, burning up at several places all at once and about to explode. So I dropped some of my commitments, and felt a lot lighter.

My schedule back in February.

There's no reason to submit yourself to so much stress just for the sake of a university application. Likewise, there's no reason to submit yourself to a grueling AP exam unless you absolutely have to, or if you truly love the subject. It's a lot better to stick with a select few things you enjoy doing. For me, it all boils down to music, writing, and fencing.

I know stability is something we all wish for, in a world with global temperatures and costs of living that just keep climbing. I know that by doing it all right, attending a good school and obtaining a good job, we hope to gain some sort of secure foothold in the world. But is this all there is to life? The pursuit of success?