Finals week is like a seven-day marathon filled with mental and physical challenges. It’s the ultimate test of how much caffeine your body can handle. As a senior at the University of California Riverside (UCR), I’ve experienced a fair variety of finals from timed essays, in-person exams, group projects and, during the pandemic, awkward virtual recordings. Each finals season brings a different kind of exhaustion and another layer of stress. I’ve learned that navigating finals week is less about perfection and more about balancing these small stresses and embracing inevitable imperfections.
For students on the quarter system, the pressure of performing well on finals can be amplified. Unlike semester-based schools with some breathing room to recover from a few missed assignments, the quarter system doesn’t provide students with the same grace. A poor midterm grade in week five can carry through, leaving students scrambling during finals week and hoping for extra credit. By the end of the quarter, staying motivated becomes a challenge.
Fall quarter finals, in particular, somehow feel even more soul-crushing. With early evenings as a result of daylight saving time, I find no motivation or will to focus on even the simplest of tasks. At this point in the quarter, I already know my grades — and for better or worse, they feel set in stone. If I was on the cusp of a pass or fail grade, I might feel a burst of motivation to push through, but since that’s not the case, it’s easy to settle into quiet resignation and start counting down the days until winter break.
Like many other college students, I am a helpless victim of constant procrastination, a
trend that will likely persist through finals week of this quarter as well. There’s a moment of panic every time I open Canvas; I start obsessively refreshing the grades tab or endlessly running GPA calculators. Something about finals brings out the worst of my anxiety, pushing me to overthink. It’s a toxic cycle; avoiding studying because I’m overwhelmed, wasting hours scrolling through TikTok, then panicking at 3 a.m. because I’ve wasted so much time on an assignment that normally takes me 30 minutes to complete.
Impostor syndrome only adds to the weight of finals week. For students whose academic identity has been a source of pride, a single tough class can shatter confidence. My first finals week at UCR taught me some important lessons on failure and how I perceive myself. In my freshman year, I bombed a timed essay final in a class where I’d felt confident all quarter. As someone who’s always identified as a “good writer,” I couldn’t help feeling bereft at the less-than-stellar grade I received. I had to remind myself that struggling in one writing class doesn’t make me the worst writer in the world and this bad grade doesn’t erase my previous accomplishments.
Finals week also comes with the temptation to overextend study plans, sacrificing sleep and mental health in the name of last-minute revision. I’ve been through my share of all-nighters fueled by energy drinks and espresso, only to crash the next day. It’s a lesson I’ve learned the hard way: taking care of yourself isn’t a waste of time. At the end of the day, choosing a short nap over ineffectively cramming for a class you don’t even care about is an act of self-love.
Despite this ever-present chaos and stress, there’s something nice about collectively basking in misery with other struggling students. Holing up at the Tomás Rivera Library with friends and trying to save the best seats inside The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf are some of the clearest memories I have of my university experience. Sharing this collective dread for finals not just with friends but everyone across campus creates a feeling of solidarity that might make finals just a little bit more bearable.
Finals week has taught me that survival isn’t about perfection. It’s about learning to manage expectations, finding small ways to care for yourself and embracing failure as part of the process. As I approach finals this quarter, I know they’ll bring stress and sleepless nights, but I’m also more confident in my ability to navigate them. Every finals week has served as a test of adaptability and resilience in determining what truly matters to me. Even if I fall a couple of points short here or there, I won’t be categorizing this as a failure.
One bad grade won’t make or break you. Even if you flunk your way through this finals season, remember winter break is just around the corner followed by another quarter filled with the same cycle of studying and sleepless nights.
