<p>I'm a freshman in High School and ever since i found this website and realized i wanted to be an investment banker and started reading stuff ive been extremely stressed out and depressed and worried that i wont get into a top 25 business school and never break into IB so literally ive done nothing but hate myself and worry for the past 2 months and i dont think its healthy. What do i do? i need to calm down but i cant!</p>
<p>Easy. Take a deep breath. Calm down. Leave this site until you’re a second semester junior.</p>
<p>Yeah ^ thats pretty much it. It’s entirely too early for you to worry about anything yet. Just know this site represents what is probably the top 10% of HS kids vying for spots in the nations best schools, definitely not your average joes here.</p>
<p>Omg… simmer down! Freshman year should not be stressful.</p>
<p>1) See a school counselor and create an education plan, it will help soothe your nerves.
2) Do your best.
3) Get involved with things you are passionate about.</p>
<p>If you do those three things, youre guarenteed college success in whatever field you end up in! :-)</p>
<p>YOu don’t seem to display any of the characteristics of an IBanker (freaking out, depressed, worried, poor judge of context, poor grasp of facts – brittle under pressure – not necessarily the life of the party, I suspect). You should perhaps look to another career.</p>
<p>But really, just relax. Most of what will get you in to a top school is beyond your control.</p>
<p>Patrick:</p>
<p>Don’t Panic.</p>
<p>Here’s my best advice to a freshman.</p>
<p>Study hard, do the best you can possibly do in your classes.
Take the most rigorous courses that you (along with your guidance counsellor) think you can handle and still do well in.
Find activities that really speak to you, and that are fun for you. Try to find something that you can excel at.</p>
<p>At this stage, that is all you can do.</p>
<p>You are correct, that it’s not healthy to be this stressed. </p>
<p>I think that your priorities are all wrong and that you are putting the cart before the horse. </p>
<p>Priority number 1 is to learn how to be happy. That does not mean irresponsible, it means liking yourself enough to learn about yourself and how you function best. Make sure that you have friends and a social life. Choose activities outside of school that you enjoy and do them because you enjoy them not because they look good on the resume. Find time for yourself. Find time to exercise. As a freshman, you shouldn’t be worrying about college. Not one iota. You have more important work to do, as I stated above. </p>
<p>Academically, do your best, but don’t get yourself into a situation where you are not getting enough sleep. It’s a huge mistake many people make. The developing teenage brain needs sleep or permanent cognitive damage can result. There is a phenomenon in our HS where students try to take too heavy an academic load so that they start to stay up all night and slowly diminish the amount of sleep that they get. Of course with less sleep, your capacity for learning goes down, and it spirals out of control so that they crash and burn, creating depression, anxiety, and really bad grades to boot. Take a challenging load but not so challenging that it’s not enjoyable. Developing a love of learning is an important skill and it’s hard to love learning when it’s taking over your life. Learning to learn is a lifelong skill, so you might as well learn to enjoy it. </p>
<p>Don’t worry about college before junior year, with the exception that if you take a class that would prepare you for an important SAT Subject test like an AP Science or precalc, by all means take the subject test at the end of your sophomore year. Otherwise, leave everything until you are a junior. </p>
<p>Once you’re a junior and you start to take standardized tests and have a GPA, you can start to assess what kind of college you want to go to. There are a lot of great schools in this country, and you will likely have good options. </p>
<p>My point is that you should first strive to become the best, happiest person that you can be. Then you think about applying to college. </p>
<p>The alternative that I think is foolish, is to set some ridiculous abstract goal like IB, and make yourself miserable for no good reason. </p>
<p>If you can’t learn to be happy in HS, when do you think you’re going to learn to be happy? When you have a multitude of adult responsibilities? Good luck.</p>
<p>All the posters that said to relax? They are right.</p>
<p>However, you CAN do a couple of EZ things that will not stress you out, but will make it easier get into a top school, if that is your goal.</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Take some of your HS’s required courses - like Driver’s Ed- in the summer. This will allow you to take more “good” courses during the regular school year. My kids used the open slot in the schedule to to take more AP courses.</p></li>
<li><p>If you can, play a varsity sport - In our District, varsity kids get out of Gym in season, and you can take a study hall, or an AP course, whichever is best for you. </p></li>
</ol>
<p>So, with summer approaching, now is the time to take an EZ step. So work hard, play hard, take it EZ, and take steps now that wil help you later. Good luck - and relax!</p>
<ol>
<li><p>I agree that you should stop reading College Confidential for now. And for a long time. It’s nerve wracking, and you seen a little bit prone to…let’s call it drama.</p></li>
<li><p>But there are some things you should do throughout high school if you have ambitions of going to a highly selective college and/or of being a high achiever generally. I stand by the advice I gave to a parent a couple of months ago in this post: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/15654379-post30.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/15654379-post30.html</a>.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>My advice? Get off CC ASAP. I’m a junior and its all very overwhelming, I can’t imagine how stressful it must be to be a freshman on here… </p>
<p>For now just do what you love and put your whole self into whatever you do, as long as you don’t go over your edge… I guess what I’m saying is, find your edge in academics, ECs, etc and stay close, but don’t push yourself too hard to go off a cliff.</p>