Every single school year students at west stress for the preparation for the semester final exams. Even though finals are meant to show the material each student remembers throughout the whole semester, they tend to cause more stress rather than happiness and achievement. Moreover, the proficiency for standard classes at West are all under 50% ranking. This comes to show that throughout the semester students are already struggling, and adding a final exam that includes all the units in one test may cause a student’s grade reputation to decrease. Final exams shouldn’t be the one test that exposes what a student knows. 

Senior Khristian Lestz agrees and says, “I believe that final exams should be stopped. Final exams can push students to cram at the last minute instead of focusing on consistent longer term learning. I believe that this brings a decline in real understanding and comprehension of lessons. In general spreading out assessments could help students learn better over time and that final exams should be stopped.”

Junior Karson Davis-Mast also agrees, “I think final exams should be stopped because students shouldn’t have to remember all they have learned the whole school year. It also causes them a lot of stress during moments when they already have a lot of summative assessments going on.”

Lastly, Senior Gregory Lee agrees and says , “I think final exams should be stopped because they put too much pressure on students all at once, which can hurt their performance instead of showing what they actually learned. The stress can outweigh the benefits and doesn’t always reflect real growth over time. Instead, students should be evaluated through consistent work and progress throughout the year. Overall, just get rid of it.”

In all, final exams do more harm than good. They create unnecessary stress  and rather promote memorization over actual understanding of the material. Schools should replace final exams with more valuable exams that will truly show a student’s growth.