On Saturday, June 10, Sentinel’s Grade 12s walked across the stage at the Westside Church to receive their place-holder diplomas. Friday, June 23, will be the last day they walk through Sentinel’s halls as high school students.
Graduation is a bitter-sweet affair. It is a ceremony of young adults, once children, facing their future full of prospects. Our grads all have the world waiting before them. Yet, graduation is also a story of departure. A group of roughly 200 teens, burnt out from their 13 years of schooling, now leave behind their alma mater, meaning nourishing mother in Latin.
For many of the grads, Sentinel must truly be their alma maters, their nourishing mothers, not necessarily due to Sentinel’s prison-like walls or the copious amounts of academic and extracurricular commitments they had to juggle, or the out-of-order washrooms, but due to the communities they have built here. Their best friends, favourite teachers, and the oddly specific places in the school at which they chose to congregate, were the qualities that deem Sentinel nourishing.
Despite its length mellowing out the sheer volume of emotion present at the turning point of these 200 odd soon-to-be graduates, the commencement ceremony was moving. As the orators announced the grads’ plans for the future, their thanks to their families and teachers, and the other announcements they felt the need to make, it was easy to imagine the grad class leaving for bigger and better opportunities, but hard to bear.
The ceremony was concluded by valedictorian Isha Mathur, who gave an insightful speech summing up the Class of 2023’s experiences of high school and expressing her thanks to her family, friends and teachers. Here is a video of her speech for those of you who could not attend the ceremony!
When asked about her emotions leading up to the speech, Isha stated that she felt scared, leading her to consume large amounts of water supplied by Ms. Battram. Mr. Huskilson was another staff member that consoled Isha as she was getting ready to speak, telling the valedictorian that she would be fine. However, the anxiety leading up to the speech was probably just due to the anticipation; Isha expressed that everything was fine once she got up and started to speak, although she lamented that the audience could not hear due to the sound system at the venue. The valedictorian also commented that public speaking is “nervy” most of the time, and this was no exception.
As to whether the valedictorian had anything to say that she could not say in the speech, Isha expressed her best wishes to everyone, wishing all good luck. She also hoped that the grad class would return to Sentinel to laugh at the new generation of grads as they go through the same journey next year. Isha also stated, “Those of you who thought I couldn’t make it, I made it! #Isha4Prez on top.”
Graduation is a celebration. Although it is a celebration of opportunities and prospects in the future, it is also one of catharsis. The graduating class get to say their final goodbyes to the place where they worked hard for the past 5 years. Eventually, by your fifth year of high school, you get exhausted. This is a systematic phenomena among Grade 12s, commonly described as “senioritis,” a supposed affliction of students in their final year of high school or college, characterized by a decline in motivation or performance according to Oxford Languages.
Isha commented that she felt especially at the brunt of senioritis prior to the infamous AP exams, a series of standardized tests many students undergo for a chance at achieving college credit. The valedictorian elaborated that this exhaustion is “a torch passed on to all grad classes,” where after a certain point, “no one cares.” Even an anonymous Grade 12 sitting beside us commented, “I’m on a 20 minute bathroom break in Calc right now!”
Isha commented that the feeling of the year coming to a close exacerbated the condition, while she also acknowledged that teachers did not “let” students be burnt out, going over new topics even as AP exams were on their doorsteps.
Isha also criticized the school’s support services for contributing to the burn-out. “They tell us we’ll be fine and throw university at you,” Isha commented, talking about the lack of support available for applying to universities outside of BC. “It takes you by surprise,” the valedictorian commented.
As for advice for rising Grade 12s, Isha suggested that Grade 11s figure out what their plans for their post-secondary life look like. As for university applications, Isha suggests that Grade 11s start them as soon as possible, commenting that it will save you “tears, stress, and late nights.”
Michelle Yang, a Grade 12 soon-to-be Psychology student at UBC, said her personal experience with senioritis started in November, and is particularly potent if you are taking AP courses. Michelle emphasized that Grade 11s should “grind hard,” as in Grade 12, many will lose motivation. Michelle also attributed harder content and greater expectations by teachers were one factor contributing to her “senioritis.” She also recommended to take advantage of breaks to rest and recover. Michelle additionally witnessed a universal drop in grades across all Grade 12 students.
The school’s discontinuation of X-Blocks for the incoming academic year was the target of one of Michelle’s criticisms. Michelle stated that she found the extra time helpful in keeping up with her work. Michelle also recommended AP courses as a method of motivating oneself, citing a peer’s AP Capstone project where findings showed that students who tended to take AP courses were less stressed and depressed. Michelle attributed this to the motivation of peers who enable you to better manage your time. Michelle wished the rising Grade 12 good luck and recommended them get their applications done before early admission.
Amy Park and Julia Dobragowski also shared that they had experienced senioritis. Julia joked that it started on the very first day of her last year of high school. They both described the experience as tough, with Julia citing that could not manage “to do any work and [she] would just stare at it.” As for what the cause was, Julia simply stated, “I know I’m done, so why bother?” Amy stated that she cried in her bed, and the university application process in its entirety was quite stressful. Julia pointed out that teachers can help by giving less work and more time to complete assignments,” albeit another student argued that this was not possible due to the semester schedule that the school ran on this year. Perhaps this will be a benefit of the linear schedule Sentinel will adopt next year.
Hopefully, the graduates of 2023 will get a chance to rest and recover over the summer before facing a new chapter in their lives that is free of high school. Learning from the experiences of the current graduating students, we can help make Sentinel more accommodating to those who are in the last chapter of their high school lives. Good luck to the class of 2023!
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