Finals Can Be Fun

The last weeks of April are a confusing time for students everywhere. April weather holds the promise of the beautiful summer days that are coming. It appears as though professors everywhere did not get the memo that beautiful weather causes a decrease in student productivity. As students get excited about the beautiful days, the reality hits that finals are just around the corner. Or in my case less than a week. If you are applying to transfer April has the added stress of waiting for news about where you are going to be next fall. Instead of discussing transfer specific stuff I want to discuss the way transferring to William & Mary has changed the way I view finals.

Finals will always be a stressful time in any student’s life. People line up for the library doors to open bright and early. You can basically hear the crunching of calculators as students figure out final grades. W&M students are characterized as being very stressed especially when finals roll around. But the school has fun events going on all during finals to help students de-stress. This was not something I have experienced before joining the W&M community. There is something going on everyday from therapy dogs to coloring to having free snacks. I remember last fall there was free Ben and jerry’s in Swem library. Even this week before finals even start there was stress balls being made in the Sadler Center. Students could have fun, and use them to relieve stress. My personal favorite will always be the therapy dogs which are on campus around midterms also to help students who are struggling.

Finals are stressful, and the idea of fun finals sounds a bit out there but I found finals to be tolerable at William & Mary. They are tolerable not because they are easy, but because the school knows this is a stressful time for everyone. All the events they host have been proven to decrease student stress, and even increase the likelihood of a student seeking help if the stress becomes too much for them. It is just another small thing on campus that makes me feel part of a community that helps to take care of one another.

-Rebecca Hill ’17