Students Prepare for Upcoming Finals
Arrowhead High School students will be taking the fall 2019 end of semester exams from January 15th to January 17th. The final exams take place for three days of the week from 7:30 a.m until 11:00 a.m at North Campus and 7:20 a.m to 10:50 a.m at South Campus.
Ellie Artone, a senior at Arrowhead High School, said, “I really hate the lead to exams, like all of the end of semester test[s] are crammed [in], plus I have so much studying to do, and I always feel like I have absolutely no time to do anything.”
All Arrowhead students must take final exams two times a year aside from the seniors who are often exempt from finals second semester. Final exams take place at the end of the semester in January and the last week of school in June.
Brooke O’Connor, a senior at Arrowhead, said, “I’m really excited to have a short week when finals come.”
Artone said, “I experience so much stress when it comes around. It is nice to have breaks during each exam.”
In both the North Campus library and South Campus library, Arrowhead High School organizes therapy dogs to come in during passing periods and while students don’t have exams.
Becky Bordon, Associate Principal at Arrowhead, said in an email, “I don’t work directly with one organization. I received the contact information from Mr. Ward who used to be a counselor here and who also used to bring Abby here for therapy with our students. The dog owners have to have their dogs formerly trained and certified to attend but they don’t have to use just one organization for that.”
Tori Kafkas, a senior at Arrowhead High School, said, “I don’t like studying for the exams, but I like the schedule for our exams. It is very relaxing, because I get to miss certain periods, and go home early.”
The final exam order goes according to the student’s schedule.
Kafkas says, “I always know what exams to prepare for the earliest since I take my exams in a row by my first hour class to my tenth hour class in the span of three days.”
Once the first bell rings, students have one hour to take their exam. Afterward, they have ten minutes to take a break before the next exam. This continues two more times and then all students are free to go. Students who don’t have a class period a certain hour of the day have the option to sit in the study hall room or not show up for the remaining time while the testing period is going on.
Artone said, “Exams will take a lot of my time and focus. I plan on studying all of this weekend and I am hoping that I will do great on them. I have 4.0 and I really don’t want to lose it by doing bad[ly] on an exam.”
Teachers are able to choose if they want their final exam to be worth 15% or 20% of the student’s semester grade.
