Top 10 Symptoms of Senioritis
Illustration by Sam Ward of USA Today
sen·ior·i·tis
ˌsēnyəˈrītis/
noun, humorous
a supposed affliction of students in their final year of high school or college, characterized by a decline in motivation or performance
“I try not to let my grades suffer from my Senioritis, but they do anyway.”
- Not Showing Up for School: Straggling into A-block a few minutes (or twenty minutes) late or not showing up at school all together, is a definite symptom of Senioritis. After AP exams in May, it is very rare to see a senior around campus. However, when seniors are spotted at RMA this late in the year, they are usually hanging out in Ms. Daniel’s office or soaking up the sun in the courtyard.
- Inability to Do Homework until the Very Last Minute: This couldn’t be a truer symptom of senioritis. Towards the end of the school year, almost everyone is guilty of finishing those last few math problems, reading the final chapters of a book, or cramming for a history test just minutes before you walk into the class. And let’s be honest, everyone knows you saved that paper that was assigned two weeks ago until the study hall before.
- Extreme Difficulty Waking Up in the Morning: As if it wasn’t already hard to get up in the mornings, it seems to be even harder to get out of bed in the final weeks of school. The real test now-a-days is seeing how many times can you press the snooze button and still make it out the door in time for homeroom at 8:00 with no shower and the same Nike shorts from the day before.
- Frantic Search for Roommates: The agonizing search for a roommate is one of the top concerns of seniors. As senior year draws to a close, the college checklist quickly becomes longer and longer, and finding a “normal” roommate is much harder than it might seem, therefore involving quite a bit of Facebook and Instagram stalking. If that isn’t bad enough, after one is finally picked out, you then have to initiate the standard roommate compatibility questions, a process that feels a lot like online dating.
- Chronic Netflix Consumption: Those long hours that you used to spend studying tend to turn into hours spent binge-watching TV shows on Netflix. With all homework that used to be priority cast to the side, seniors, more often than not, give into the oh-so-tempting ten second lag in between episodes of their favorite Netflix addictions.
- Sense of Superiority: We do what we want, when we want, if we want to do it. Most of the time it doesn’t get done, but we like to think it will. Walking the halls for the last few times during the final weeks of school definitely gives you a sense of superiority before you start it all over again as the low men on the totem pole.
- Loss of Interest in Your Appearance: Well, this one is obvious. On any given day, you will see the majority of RMA high school girls sporting Nike shorts, an oversized t-shirt, and tennis shoes. Basically, the only time you won’t see this preferred outfit is on game day when actually dressing up for school is required.
- Counting Down the Seconds until Spring Break: During the third trimester, it seems that Spring Break is the only thing that will be able to get you through the rest of the school year. Almost every day you will hear a senior ask “how many more days until spring break?”, as it feels like the school days get longer and longer, leading up to the much needed week off.
- Decreased Athletic Ability: As great as spring sports are, the desire just seems to disappear, just like in academics. Practices are filled with goofing off and tons of laughs. Plus, who wants to run around in eighty degree weather anyway?
- Difficulty Reading Things that are Longer than a Few Paragraphs: By this point, the attention span is just gone, explaining why most seniors probably did not make it past number four on this list.
