Although we all strive to do well on our midterms this should not occur at the expense of our physical and mental well-being
With exam season fast approaching, many students are slowly starting to forget about their own well-being. All-nighters, avoiding breaks and skipping meals will be the daily norm as libraries are filled to the brim with students focused on achieving one goal - getting a good grade.
Under the pressure of succeeding in rigorous university classes, students are forced to prioritize their GPAs above everything – but at what cost?
Under no circumstances is it okay to place your academics above your mental well-being, especially during high-stress periods like exam season. In fact, during times like these, it’s important to prioritize yourself to avoid psychological distress.
Under no circumstances is it okay to place your academics above your mental well-being, especially during high-stress periods like exam season. In fact, during times like these, it’s important to prioritize yourself to avoid psychological distress.
You should not be pushing through deteriorating mental health for the sake of an exam. By doing so, students are making themselves susceptible to psychological distress, academic burnout, and isolation from the damaged relationships. Indulging in these typical exam activities infrequently may be okay for the time being. However, when consistently making these activities common practice many long-term adverse health implications accompany that.
For example, you may have skipped lunch today because you have an exam at 4 p.m. You may think that using this extra time to study might help you do better on your exam than if you were to grab lunch.
In the short term, you are now starving during your exam which may distract you and make it difficult to concentrate on the exam. However, if you continue to skip meals you are putting yourself at risk for health issues such as mood swings and brain fog. Over time, more concerning consequences can arise too, like fainting and muscle loss, contributing to more illnesses that can cause you a trip to the emergency room.
Experiencing these extreme health implications will only worsen over time if students continue to study all night and isolate themselves from friends and family.
Even though exam season is riddled with anxiety and stress, it is important to understand that the habits we develop during these academically critical periods will have long-term negative impacts on our health. When our health is impacted, our performance on exams is also negatively impacted.
So, what really are the benefits of neglecting our wellbeing?
Although skipping study breaks may help you perform well on your first exam, it’s very likely that continuing these habits will prevent you from performing well on future exams. Additionally, you may begin to experience insomnia, psychological distress, and increased stress levels. Overall, these short-term practices not only have negative health implications in the long term, but they also impact your performance on exams as December progresses.
As hard as it may be, students should not sacrifice their well-being temporarily for exams as the consequences follow us well after. We must recognize that regardless of the intentions for indulging in these practices, there are very minimal benefits to experience during exam season.
We must recognize that regardless of the intentions for indulging in these practices, there are very minimal benefits to experience during exam season.
In fact, prioritizing our well-being can demonstrate academic benefits that will allow us to excel during exams. For example, eating nourishing meals throughout this stressful period can increase mental alertness and stabilize your energy levels allowing you to perform better on exams.
With exams quickly approaching, it's important to remember that sacrificing your well-being to upkeep an ideal GPA can lead to unhealthy habits appearing in the long-term concerns. Taking care of your health, such as eating well and taking breaks.
For students worrying about one 50 per cent weighted exam determining whether they pass or fail, there may be help coming in the future. The McMaster Students Union university affairs committee has begun their advocacy efforts to push to eliminate “high-risk” exams worth 50 per cent or more of a student’s grade.
This goal was outlined in the 2017-2018 MSU academic success policy paper but has been actively taken up this year by the University Affairs committee, headed by associate vice president (University Affairs) Tasneem Warwani. It is part of a broader initiative to review “academic services.”
As it stands, there is no official McMaster policy capping the weight of an exam. The committee is concerned that heavily-weighted assessments can be increasingly stressful for students and do not set students up for success.
“You can do phenomenally throughout the semester and then you can have something happen,” Warwani said. “If you do so well throughout the semester and then you are writing a 70 per cent exam and you just crash and burn during the exam, it does not make sense that you should fail entirely based on that.”
The Student Representative Assembly engineering caucus is also working to eliminate high-risk exams for engineering students. However, the university affairs committee is aiming for a university-wide policy.
High-risk exams sometimes occur when students use their McMaster Student Absence Form for an assignment or midterm, and the re-weighting makes the final exam “high-risk.” Under the accommodation section, the McMaster Undergraduate Course Management Policies recommends that an instructor should seek approval before re-weighting one assessment to 75 per cent or more.
The University Affairs committee ultimately wants to see a hard cap at 50 per cent, even in MSAF cases. Warwani suggested other alternatives to shifting weight to a final exam, such as rewriting an evaluation, should be more standardized.
Warwani acknowledges that professors often have legitimate reasons for being reluctant to reschedule missed tests.
“There are lots of things that might be a little bit more difficult to do but if it means that our students are succeeding from it, then I think that we should be moving towards those,” Warwani said. “I am hopeful that we can find some sort of middle ground.”
Warwani said that one situation where a high-risk exam could be acceptable is in a structure with different weighing options where the professor weighs exams more heavily only if it results in a higher grade for a student.
The university affairs committee also aims to work towards having more specific standardized MSAF policies on course outlines. Warwani believes that if the outlines are clearer on how and when accommodations will be provided in the case of MSAFs, students and professors will be better off, and students will not be uncertain about whether an MSAF now will mean writing a high-risk exam later.
Currently, the committee is still researching the issue to determine which faculties are most affected and to what extent. They plan to release an online “info pack” document on the issue for students in the next couple of months. From there, they will begin formally consulting with university administration and faculty coordinators to move from advocacy to potential policy.
For any sort of policy to be considered, the issue must be discussed first in the university senate. The process of advocating for the elimination of high-risk exams is a big project for the committee and has only just begun.
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