<p>I have 3 SAT subjects coming up in about 5 days and the following week 3 APs. I have a test every day this week but I am already burnt out from the school year. At the beginning of the year I got easy As in all of my APs and high honors religious classes. I go to school from 8-5:30 which is obviously difficult, especially considering the workload that comes with 7 high honors religious classes, high honors Hebrew, 3 APs, and high honors math. I belong to several clubs such as mock trial, science league, model un, environmental club, etc. I need all of this to get into my ideal school (UPenn) Ive given up friends, free time, sleep, and all things fun. I get 3 hours of sleep a night if im lucky. </p>
<p>Lately I have been failing all of my tests. This week i studied for a history test for 8 hours- i got a 77. I studied for bio for 10 hours- i got a 65. What am I supposed to do? I can look at a page for hours and cant comprehend what its saying</p>
<p>not to be too blunt or anything but have you tried something called sleep.
if you’re taking a higher level bio class you should kno this by now that youre brain and for tht matter ur body also needs some rest to function properly and trust me 3 hours a day is not enough rest if you cant get 8 hours in try to get in atleast 6 hours.</p>
<p>no sleep = bad grades. you can’t function properly with 3 hours of sleep. high school is supposed to be a time for fun and social life, but with a good amount of schoolwork as well. I know many people who have gotten into UPenn and have very good social lives. quit being such a robot and live a little.</p>
<p>You are being foolish. Your mind will always lose to your body, so don’t try to fight it ( this is unproductive), try to balance it. Obviously, 3 hours of sleep is going to fry your brain. Take a look around you at the 7 hr sleepers who are getting higher scores than you with half the studying and learn.</p>
<p>Oh and by the way, killing your social life will get you nowhere.</p>
<p>You could try going to your doctor and getting a script for Adderall or other psychostimulants so you can function with little sleep, just like the tweakers do. </p>
<p>and if it makes you feel any better, I’m in the same boat as you, if not worse off.
I have 2 SAT Subject Tests this coming Saturday which I am currently furiously cramming for. Then, next week, I have 7 AP tests (I haven’t really studied at all), all my clubs (Student Government, Rotary Club, Medicine Club, Environmental Club, etc.), finals (I don’t know why they’re so early), Piano State Competition Finals, Band Tryouts, Flute/Piano State Meet, these comprehensive tests my school is giving out, and a major 5 chapter test in Biology next Monday.</p>
<p>so, I’d say to get some sleep, seriously. Staying up till dawn isn’t going to help your grades at all, unless you’re like an insomniac or perpetually have caffeine pumping in your blood.</p>
<p>also, don’t throw away your social life. Trust me, one of my “friends” at school threw away her social life and personality in hopes of getting into Harvard or whatever (she’s literally become a robot who’s always thinking about how to get the upper hand in school/GPA/rankings and is always studying), and, now, practically the entire school hates her. Live a little, have fun with your friends, and know that the end is almost here :)</p>
<p>Get out and play a sport with friends. I wish I could, but I’m injured. High school is a nice part of life, so don’t let tests and homework ruin it too much.</p>
<p>^That actually may not be a bad idea. LOL my brother was so burnt out in his studies. He smoked weed and got high before he took the SATs the next day. He scored a 2330…</p>
<p>Use some of those 8 hours you spend staring at your notes or textbook to just get some sleep. You’re not helping yourself at all if you just don’t absorb any of the information. Just sleep whenever you have time- if you have half an hour after you get home before you have some kind of activity, sleep for that half hour.</p>
<p>I doubt this person actually gets 3 hours of sleep consistently every night. After a while your body would revolt and you would just fall asleep while working (I know, this is how I sleep in college!). Probably an exaggeration.</p>
<p>I can relate. I’m a senior now, but I remember being in a similar position around this time last year - 3 subject tests to take over the weekend, 3 APs the next week, loads of extracurriculars. In my case, this was about 15 hours of soccer (plus another 4 or 5 for driving to/from practices), track every day, work 10 hours a week, and Interact Club. Trust me - I know how frustrating it can be.</p>
<p>HOWEVER, think of it this way: you have literally two more weeks of pushing yourself and then it’s. over. Your AP classes will be done, because the exams will be over; you can relax a bit (or take a mental health day from school, sleep until noon, and then watch the Office for three hours. Hehe.). Seriously, that is how I got through these brutal few weeks - telling myself that it would be over soon.</p>
<p>In addition, if you’re studying 8 hours for a bio test and getting a 65 - maybe you should thnk about the efficiency with which you study? 8 hours seems a little extreme - and I say this as a former AP Bio student. Tests suck - we would have them every two-three weeks, and they would span 100-200 pages of the textbook. Maybe taking notes beforehand would help? And studying off of them? Either way, if you’re not sleeping, your brain won’t absorb any of it - we actually learned in psych that you NEED sleep or else your brain will not be able to recall short-term memory.</p>
<p>In conclusion, get some sleep. And hang in there! It’ll be over (or at least better) soon. :)</p>
<p>Studying has some serious diminishing marginal returns. Try sleeping instead of studying, like everybody else said. Also, you don’t have to be in all those clubs, especially if you don’t really do much in them. I think that it’s better to just focus on a few things.</p>