All of you who are reading this have been through high school to get the great university that is Penn State. It took a lot of work to get here. Many students have had late nights and felt the pressure to ace the SATs, volunteer more than anyone else, get good grades, and somehow still be involved in clubs and activites after school. For some of you, that meant intense athletic practices or late night drama rehearsals. The more I thought about this topic, the more I realized how insane the college application process is, which lead me to wonder- is society putting too much pressure on high school students?
Although common sense told me that school is a significant source of stress in a young person’s life, as Andrew says, “Your intuition is lousy.” The first thing I needed to do was figure out if there was any evidence to support my assumption. According to this poll done by the Associated Press and MTV, school is the largest source of stress in kids. Although there may be some voluntary response bias, the data seems sound. After further investigation, I found this NBC new article confirming my suspicion that not only are teens stressed, they are more stressed than adults.
Now that we know that we know that school is a stressor in a young person’s life, we need to break that general topic into more specific catagories.
In order to most accurately determine the pressure on high school students, I decided to focus on three catagories that can be some of the most stressful in a students life.
- Taking the SATs
- Taking advanced classes
- College applications
Taking the SAT
Taking the SATS can be extremely stressful for a student, particularly if he or she is not a good test taker. Even though this subject is something that every many high schoolers experience, there is little to no research about how taking the SATs can affect the stress level of high school students. For something so prevalent in the college application process, there is very little scientific data discussing it. I was interested in reading the study mentioned in this NPR interview, but the link was broken and searching for the article specifically yielded no results. Without any data, I am unable to conclude whether or not the level of stress placed on a student while they are taking the SATs is too much. I am able to tell you that more students than ever before are taking the SATs and the prep classes associated with them.
Taking advanced classes (IB)
One of the most common advanced class options in high school is through the International Baccaluareate Program. This program challenges participants by having them take rigourous courses, do research, and complete community service. “Sources of Stress for Students in High School College Prepatory and General Education Programs…”, a study done in 2009, concludes that IB students and students in the general education program have different stressors and reactions to them. One very notable example is the difference in the most common types of stress. Students in the general population noted that most of their stress came from a variety of sources, while IB student specifically pointed out academics as their key stress point. Although both groups indicated academic stress, this was the only 
category out of the many in the study that IB students had significantly higher levels of than general education students. Yet, the more stress the IB students had, the worse they handled it, leading to poorer grades.
Another study done on three different schools found similar results with one notable exception: Students with elevated stress levels did not have damaged psychological functioning. “Changes in Stress and Psychological Adjustment During the Transition to High School Among Freshmen in an Accelerated Curriculum” states the IB students had normal or even superior psychological functioning compared to their general education counterparts.
College Applications
The first thing to note about my research involving the college application project is how little empirical data there is on stress levels of students applying to college. There are plenty of tips and tricks to “de-stress” about the process, but no real data about it in the first place. What I was able to find was a study by the U.S. National Library of Medicine discussing how much more competitive college has gotten and the reaction of students to it. “Playing the Admissions Game…” describes how the number of students applying to college is growing, but the amount of students a school accepts is not growing at the same pace. This is causing the competition to increase so much that a student, who a decade earlier would have been accepted to a top school, is now fighting for the middle tier colleges. The study goes on to say that there is evidence to support the idea that pushing students to strive only for college admissions can be damaging to actual learning. However, some people believe that increased competition can be a motivation for students to work harder.
In Conclusion: Is society putting too much pressure on high school students?
After careful consideration of the studies and information above, I have decided that society is putting too much pressure on high school students. The collegiate system of admissions is becoming more and more difficult to enter as the decades pass. This is causing students to students to put more time, money, and other resources to work than is good or feasible long-term. It’s almost like you could be the best person in the world and still not be good enough. Taking upper level courses can be beneficial to your mental health, but the minute you get too many, things start to head south fast. The teen years are supposed to be some of the most carefree of your life as you learn to build healthy relationships and take on responsibility. Stressing out teens too early is building an unhealthy mentality that will accompany many young people into adulthood.
Now it’s your turn. Let me know about your applications experience and the stress it caused or didn’t cause you in the comments below. Did the pressure make you work harder and better? Did it cause you to put aside things you truly enjoy? I want to know how you feel!
That’s all for now.
Meghan
I think, after reading this blog post, that increasing stress on incoming college students could actually be a positive thing. After all, generally speaking, few people stress over things they don’t consider to be important. So, perhaps, as each poll shows more and more students stressing…maybe this, instead of being something negative, displays an increasing focus on education in society. This is why kids stress- they know how important education is. As time goes on, it could hold true that society stresses over college more because they value college (and education) more. And, in addition, perhaps the increasing requirements mean an increasing societal standard. Linked result after result could then, maybe, lead to a higher standard of overall living in this country (all linking back to the increased focus on the importance of education). Even in this class, Andrew constantly says “Take this class seriously.” If we take it seriously, we can only assume stress will ensue. So when stress ensues with education, it might just mean that we’re taking education more seriously as a society. Maybe, increased stress might not be such a bad thing overall? ? If…of course…students don’t let it get the best of them.
The three categories you have chosen to study (SATs, advanced classes, and college applications) are certainly huge aspects of being a high school student and are stressed as the most important things during high school. I am curious as to if the stress caused by the three categories you have chosen are more stressful than having high social status. In other words, how does the stress caused by trying to be popular and having a wonderful social experience rank among more academically inclined categories? I believe this is an interesting question because bullying is so prominent in middle school and high school and we are continuously reminded of the devastating statistics on self-harm as a result of bullying and the inability to make friends/to have a great social experience, etc. It would be interesting to possibly see a poll done on how many students believe trying to have the social experience that they want causes more stress than academics and applying to college.