With the new school year comes new classes, friends, and of course, stressors. What are students from all grade levels, and teachers thinking about the first marking period? Here is what some students think.

Kathleen W, a freshman from New Providence High School, faced the challenges typically expected by new high school students. Although she felt comfortable with her grades, she saw room for improvement:  “I feel like I could have done better in my honors bio class just because I ended off with a ‘B’ and I could have done better in language arts because I ended off with a ‘C’.”

Mr. Carrell teaches a variety of math related classes at NPHS, including a Statistics class for 12th graders. He believes that the first marking period went smoothly, and that the academic performance of students has actually been better than past years.

He said his biggest expectation from a student is “to work hard, and to care about their performance. All that really matters to me is they’re a better math student in June than they were in September.”

Carrell said he believes that as long as students are really focused in his class, they are able to make this progress. He also thinks the first marking period met this expectation, and his students are making wonderful progress.

With the anticipation and preparation for their lives beyond K-12 education, Juniors and Seniors face the college rush. They have to make sure their grades are in check, they have reached the correct amount of credits needed, they have studied for SATs, and written their application essays. These final years of high school place the more pressure on students than they have ever experienced.

Of course, students and teachers can agree that grades do not always reflect a student’s learning capacity or intellect.  That hardly matters, though, when a student is stressed out.

Junior Aaria Nadar battles AP and honors classes in order to meet her expectations as a student. She had a successful first marking period, reaching A’s and B’s in the most difficult classes, but said: “I hate grades. I hate my GPA. I have a good GPA but I hate the stress of GPAs.”