The term junioritis probably is seen as one used to fish for sympathy or to describe chronic procrastination. But for me it’s the reason I wake up every morning wondering if dropping out and joining the circus is really that bad of a choice.

Throughout my school career I have been told to wait. I have been told to wait until I’m older, or that I’m “just a kid,” and I don’t have to be worrying about “all that right now”.

I guess my grace period is up. I guess it’s time to stop waiting.

Now I guess it’s time to roll out of bed a brand new Adult™ ready to take things seriously.

Between the ACT and the SAT being shoved down our throats, the college visits, the financial worries and the teachers who say things such as “they won’t be this nice in college,” I can see how the term junioritis is well fit.

In the medical world, –itis means the swelling of a particular organ. In this case it means, “Could I possibly be more tired?”

They don’t do much to prepare us for the stress junior year puts on us 16- and 17-year-olds they expect to grow up overnight. They expect us to, after 10 years of telling us that we’re just kids, pull on our big person britches and decide our future. When you’ve been treated like a kid for the past however long and now you suddenly have to be making all these decisions, it’s pretty gosh darn stressful.

Sure they might think they’re helping by increasing workloads, handing out more responsibilities and telling us “they won’t coddle you like this in college,” but all they’re really doing is setting us up for failure.

By increasing workloads, teachers are piling work on kids, um sorry, adults, who have not learned how to correctly manage time. By doling out responsibilities they are sending the message that things like mental health and sleep should be put on the back burner because school is more important.

Perhaps PHS could use early-release Wednesday homeroom time to allow juniors a chance to do some ACT prep?

So yeah, I might be procrastinating doing my homework, and yeah, I might want to stay in bed instead of dragging myself to school every morning, but it’s the product of junioritis, not the cause of it.