When I think over my high school
years, I remember how much I changed and what I learned.
Entering high school as a naïve 14 year-old
freshman to graduating as an 18 year-old college bound senior, I realize my
experiences helped to shape who I am now.
The SATs gave me an important lesson that I always try to keep in mind.
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| At my high school graduation |
The
SATs is one of the most dreaded acronyms for high school students attending
college, or at least for me, my junior year in high school.
I had decided to not take my SATs until March
of junior year so that I could have all year to study and prepare for the
SATs.
As most of my planned “studying”
in high school, I ended up procrastinating and not studying.
Then suddenly in class, the week before my
scheduled SATs, I was surfing the Internet and came across a website talking
about Early Assurance programs for medical schools.
Early Assurance programs are agreements
between medical schools and colleges stating if students maintain a certain GPA
and have certain SATs they are guaranteed admissions into medical school.
The magic number that most of the programs
required was a 1450 or above in Math and Critical Reading.
As soon as I read about Early Assurance
programs, I knew that I wanted to be apart of them.
However, I also knew that I had not prepared
at all for the SATs and I’d probably not score well.
This sudden awareness that I had to score
well on the SATs brought panic to me.
I
spent the entire week running scenarios through my head.
If I got the score, I could envision myself
standing in a white lab coat in a hospital just like the doctors in a scene
from
Grey’s Anatomy.
At the same time I envisioned my future as a
doctor, I had the terrible thought of failing the test and could see myself as
an adult stuck with the same job as I had in high school, waitressing.
The entire week instead of preparing for the test,
I spent my time worrying about my
hypothetical future.
The
Friday night before the test, I had everything prepared for the next day.
I had my admission ticket to the SATs printed
off, 2 brand-new number two pencils sharpened, my calculator, extra batteries,
and snacks packed in a bag and ready to grab for the next day.
My high school does not offer SATs so I had
to register to take the test at a neighboring school.
Because I live in a rural area, I always plan
to leave extra time getting to places in case I get stuck behind a tractor
driving on the road.
Since, I had never
driven to the school and I get lost easily, I didn’t just use the GPS in my
jeep but the one on my phone as well.
I
left 45 minutes for 20-minute drive.
Needless to say, with the help of my 2 GPS’s I arrived to the testing
center 25 minutes early.
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| Typically found on the roads of Adams County |
Unlike
at most high schools, where there is a person assigned to stand at the entrance
and direct students to their assigned room, the school did not have a person to
help.
Instead, hanging on the door was a
list with all the students taking the test and their assigned room
numbers.
There was no map or
instructions to find the rooms.
So I
ended up wandering the halls of the school looking for the room.
The extra 25 minutes I had to find the room
started ticking by.
I walked up and down
one hallway and the next trying to find my assigned room.
A cold sweat started forming and panic hit
that I would not find the room in time.
The
school was also not a pretty school like my high school.
The walls in the hallways were not a newly
painted crisp white color but instead were a dingy and drab tan.
Lockers lined both hallways so that there was
only room for windows above them.
The
windows were too high for anyone to look out them and their only purpose to let
light in.
The overall affect of the
hallway gave the feeling of being trapped in a basement or prison cell.
My unwelcoming surroundings and the stress of
not finding the room made the panic I was feeling grow.
Luckily by chance, I stumbled upon my room
with just 3 minutes to spare.
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| Similar to what the hallways looked like |
The
room I was assigned to ended up being a biology classroom.
Like the rest of the school, the walls were a horrid
light blue color unlike the soothing pastel yellow classrooms in my school. Posters on the bulletin board reminded
students of the dress code and included examples of acceptable and unacceptable
clothing. I kept looking at the pictures
and could not stop thinking to myself why would anyone want to wear something
that ugly anyway. My desk had uneven
legs so if that when I would move; the desk would go up and down. The person in front of me had the same last
name as me. Because Seifert is not a
common last name, I kept staring at the back of their head trying to figure out
if I had found a long lost cousin. Meanwhile,
the person to the left of me looked and smelled like they had been wearing the
same clothes for the past week. The
person behind me kept making guttural sounds with their throat. If I closed my eyes, their weird throat
noises sounded like a cat trying to cough up a hairball. Overall, the room and its occupants were a
distraction from the test. I had to keep
telling myself focus, focus, focus.
While, I was distracted, I was also nervous. I could not hold my hands steady because I
was shaking from my nerves. I could not
fully fill in the circles because my hands were shaking so badly. I felt the anxiety of not being prepared for
the test and the importance the test had in determining my future. Hours later, the proctor announced the
completion of the test and I let the dread of the test melt away.
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| My frustration taking the test |
The results of the SATs do not come
out until three Thursdays after the test is administered. During those three weeks I tried to put the
memory and thought of the SATs out of my mind.
Knowing that if I thought about the SATs even a little I would start to
obsess about them. The weeks luckily
went by quickly and with the distraction of staying busy with track, I did not
think about them until the day before.
One of my friends reminded me that the results came out the next
day. Instantly, I became nervous and
anxious about the results. That night I
tried to go to sleep at my normal time of 11.
I kept tossing and turning for almost an hour. When I looked at the clock it said 11:50 and
decided I could wait 10 minutes, see my score, and then go to sleep. I stared at my computer waiting for the
longest 10 minutes to go by. Then at
midnight, I logged onto the SAT’s website to see my score. Unbeknown to me, when the SATs say that they
post on the third Thursday, they do not mean as soon as it is Thursday. After doing some quick Internet research I
found out that they are not actually posted until 6AM on Thursday. So I went back to bed and tried to
sleep. Finally 6AM arrived, and as
calmly as possible I went on to the SAT website, put in my username and
password, and logged on. I scrolled down
to the scores and looked the numbers. I
saw a 7 in front of my reading score and then scrolled down farther on the page
and saw a 7 in front of my math score. I
was too anxious to do mental math, so I had to use the calculator app on my
phone. I put in my scores and screamed. I had gotten over a 1450. I ran to my parent’s room, woke them up, and
told them the news.
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| Like Cinderella waiting for Midnight |
This entire experience happened during
my junior year of high school. That summer I decided that I did not want to
commit myself to a program that will dedicate to medical school. Ironically, I decided to not apply to any
Early Assurance programs and am unsure of my future still. The experience taught me that even though I
may stress and worry about something, the anxiety will not change
anything. I also have come to realize
that even though in the moment situations may seem monumental, they may not be
as important as they seem. SATs at the
time seemed like they would determine my entire future when in actuality they
meant nothing. Now as a college student,
I realize that most of things I worried about in high school do not matter
here. When I stress about something in
college now, I remember how much wasted energy I spent worrying about my SATs,
and remember to take a step back and realize that whatever I am stressed about
is probably as significant as I am making it.
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| Celebrating Graduation with my high school class; NOT one time did my SATs cross my mind |
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