A. It’s easy to forget how many college students spend majority of their day or time stressed out. It’s no easy task to balance classes, do well on exams, projects, homework, and even extra-curricular activities the work is enough to make anyone feel overwhelmed and in my case especially during final exams. Academic performance and grades throughout your college career can have large stressful impact on you. I identify academic performance pressure as a stressor simply because coursework is not only demanding but the competition for earning top marks and remaining on the dean’s list and receiving good grades is fierce.
B. There are many problems associated with academic pressure on the college level. Consistently poor academic performance
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A big cause of academic pressure relates to students having poor time management. Students have to take into consideration the course load verse the time available as a stressful factor in academic pressure. My perception of course load positively correlates with exam stress and academic pressure. Problems with this stressor can also lead to all different kinds of side effects including depression which can contribute or interfere with effective study habits and as a result weaken academic achievement even more. Problems associated with this stressor can even lead or affect a student’s future. The competition for grades, and maintaining good grades and academic achievement not only can affect student’s career choices but can even create financial problems as a result of paying for tuition and expenses anyway even after not performing well academically. Weather you perform well or not, academically performance can affect students who are planning to apply for admission to graduate school while they struggle to excel. The same is true for those who need or are seeking scholarship funding or have no other choice …show more content…
There are different ways to plan and overcome some of the obstacles listed above. My first way would be using a reward system. Giving myself a small reward whenever I finish a semester with good grades doesn’t necessarily show I lowered my stress but gives me incentives to remind myself to keep calm because it’s all worth it in the end. Even giving myself a small reward when I finish studying for test such as a quick check on my facebook feed or a 5 minute walk could also help to lower the stress. Also knowing my limits with how much academic pressure I can handle is important and can help overcome some of my obstacles as well. Another thing I can plan is if I know I have three tests in three days in the same week I could skip going out on the previous weekend and spend more time studying in order to reduce the feeling of stress and help to remove the academic pressure. Goal setting is also a great way to help overcome the obstacles when dealing with academic pressure. Goal setting is not only about sacrifice but helps you maintain good grades and a high G.P.A and in return helps you work towards your goals and lower stress. As part of my plan is being aware of when I am stressing, and start doing instead. Meaning, being conscious of the amount of time I spend stressing over academics and try to limit it. Instead of focusing my energy and time on how much work I have to do I should invest my time in the work I can do, while I chip away at the material and work that
In the essay “College Pressures” by William Zinsser, Zinsser speaks about the pressures and anxiety that plague college students, all the while wishing that they had “a chance to savor each segment of their education as an experience in itself and not as a grim preparation for the next step.” Referring to the 1979 generation of college students as “panicky to succeed”, he lists four of the following stressors for college students.
Zinsser, William. “College Pressure.” The Norton Reader. 13th ed. Ed. Linda H. Peterson. New York: Norton, 2013. 380-388. Print
The article “College Pressures” is an examination of how there is both self-imposed and external pressure on college students. The article also examines the ways these forms of pressure affected students, and how they cope. In “College Pressures” William Zinsser uses Exemplification, Division-Classification, and Descriptive Imagery to describe the Psychological and Emotional pressure that college can present; and examines how these pressures have narrowed the perception of what success embodies for an individual’s life. The beginning of “College Pressures” starts with a student, Carlos, who details his anxiety over his studies. In it he talks about not being able to manage his classwork, and how the stress from all of his responsibilities has taken a lot out of him physically.
Palmer, Barbara. “Pressure for Good Grades Often Lead to high stress, cheating, professors say.” Stanford News. 23 Feb. 2005. n. pag. Web. 4 March 2014.
4 Giancola, J.K., Grawitch, M.J., and Borchert, D. (2009). Dealing with the stress of college: A
Stress is an important problem faced by many college students, especially first year students, and it can have some large impacts on college freshmen. For example, according to Hirsch and Keniston (1970), about half of first year students do not graduate from college due to dropping out (p. 1-20). Also, David Leonhardt (2009) agrees that the United States excels at putting “teenagers in college, but only half of students who enroll end up with a bachelor’s degree” (p. 1). In addition, the level of stress seems to increase each year. For instance, the National Health Ministries (2006) claim that many college students have become “more overwhelmed and stressed” than the student generation of the last fifteen years (p. 2). Also, the percentage of first year students feeling stressed is greater than thirty percent (National Health Ministries 2006). If the problem of stress is not resolved properly, th...
Academic stress is common for college students. For many students, going to college is more than just attending classes and taking notes. They usually have a hard time understanding school guidelines and deciding what major they want to study. It is very stressful to read and understand all the school policies, especially the transfer instructions. It is even harder for student to make up their mind what major they should concentrate on.
Driscoll, E. (2013) Stress in College: What Causes it and How to Combat it, FOX Business, 73(12)
Leaving home for the first time and going away for school can be very difficult for some people. In many cases for college freshmen this is their first time being away from their home and parents. Many times they get home sick and want to isolate themselves. They have to get into a new routine of going to school, and change can be very difficult. It is definitely hard to get into the swing of college. They have to navigate through classes in a new format while living away from all the comforts of parents. A college student’s life usually consists of attending classes, long hours of studying, working at a job (sometimes), and having a social life. Some students work at a job or study harder than others, but they are all trying to get degrees so maybe one day they will have meaningful and significant lives. It is a constant struggle for everyone who is trying desperately to make him or herself into a success. And every college student wants to be involved with something in order to further their education, or just have fun. There are lots of new opportunities out there. The struggle consists of demands on time, financial pressures, parental pressure and conflicts, interpersonal conflicts, managing freedom, peer and academic pressure and the transitional period to a new academic environment (Stanford University 4). All of these factors combined can cause emotional disturbances and one of the most common is stress.
NZTC (2015) states that stress is one of the biggest factor that can affect a student’s study this is due to the pressure of the high demand of their time. Being stressed affects you mentally, socially and physically and have many negative side effects a few of these are exhaustion, headaches, sleeplessness and loss of appetite. Stress isn’t good for your health or well-being, this is why it is important to identify any causes of stress and to have strategies that will help manage stress. Going to the doctor for advice, searching the internet and seeking help from student support are some of the strategies that can help you deal with stress. (NZTC, 2015) There are many different steps that you can use to help reduce stress the only problem is finding the right ones for you. One of those steps that I will be using, is to break down your work load into smaller tasks that are manageable and can be prioritized easily. Another of the steps could be to use physical activities to help work off stress, or I could use yoga and breathing exercises to help control stress and helps you to relax. Most importantly, I should talk to someone, whether it be a family member or a friend, I can even talk to the Student Support Team if stress is affecting your
Academic stress can take complete control over the student enduring it. Researchers say that the most common form of anxiety causing academic stress is achievement anxiety. This type of anxiety is likely to occur when a student has a fear of failure in an academic related situation. However a report conducted in 2000, Research in Higher Education” showed that academic stress and achievement anxiety can have a positive effect on a students grades. This is because students are aware of the fa...
There are many ways that should be implemented in order to reduce the stress on students so that they can thrive because, without them, the school systems will only be creating generations of stressed out, materialistic, and miseducational students (Palmer, 2005). There are multiple causes when it comes to stressed out students. First, consider where the pressure is coming from for students to get good grades. Parents and teachers tend to be the main suspects. Parents want to see their kids succeed in everything they do, and grades are no different.
College is a time of extreme stress due to societal and parental pressures. College students have expectations they have to live up to in order to fulfill and satisfy the needs of both their parents and society. Stress is expressed through a variety of symptoms that can be hazardous to student’s physical and mental health. With such high expectations to do well during college, students may become sleep deprived, which impairs mental capacity, but sleep deprivation is only one of a vast array of symptoms. Stress is present in all aspects of life and there are multiple causes of stress, especially, during the college period which may present itself through many symptoms, but with stress, there are also various coping methods to help students deal with it.
The academic pressure is one of the major stress factors in my life. The academic environment is very competitive and everyone wants to be the best. Not only are am I competing with my peers, I am also competing with myself. I always want to exceed my expectations. Which can cause me to become anxious at times. The academic pressure has many sublevels to it. Making excellent grades, homework, projects, essays, online work, class scheduling, exams, and many other aspects that are involved with school.
Sometimes a student need to take six to seven classes per semester and the professors can assign new assignments for each classes. The students need to submit all the assignments before the deadline and as the deadline closes in pressure keeps building up. It can monumental task to complete two to three assignments a day or sometimes up to seven per week. Thus, the students will not have enough time to concentrate on the assignments as they also need to do other things such as attending classes, getting involved in co-curricular activities and part time job. Thus, the students will be stressed because of lack of time to finish the assignments. Some assignments are group assignments that need to be done with other students. If every group member cannot give their full commitment to do the assignments together, the students will be stressed too. So a lot of assignments can be one of the causes of stress among university students. And then there are exams and midterms which can be very stressful on it 's own as the results of those exams will reflect on a student 's future career