Brace yourself, the end of the semester is upon us

The end of semester madness has arrived once again: last minute papers, essays, presentations, and the most dreaded of all, final exams. It is the time of year where libraries are filled with overly stressed out students and where the coffee business is booming!

Studies concerning burnout and undergraduate students indicate that there is an increase rate in burnout over an academic cycle. To everyone who has been in University, these findings are far from surprising as we all have experienced an excessive amount of stress and exhaustion during exam periods. A longitudinal study of academic burnout and working undergraduate at the University of Johns Hopkins showed that although academic exhaustion seem to increase over the fall semester, it tends to remain constant during the winter semester. Furthermore, as the academic exhaustion increase, so did the academic cynicism within students. However, this same study showed that despite all the exhaustion and sarcasm related to academics, the student’s academic efficacy seem to also increase as the semester goes by. As such, maybe not everything about the end of the semester madness is necessarily bad. A little bit of stress, is good stress!

Studies have also demonstrated that being surrounded by love ones during periods of extreme stress can help. Therefore, during this academic peak stress period, please take the time to bring a friend with you to the library or to a coffee shop and make it a study date. Misery surely does love company and in this case, it could benefit you both. You are not alone!

In the end, this is just a simple reminder to BREATH! This is probably not the first end of semester you have experienced and it is probably not your last. Your health is IMPORTANT! You’ve made it this far!

YOU CAN DO THIS!