By Travis Ostby

As the nine weeks comes to a close, students and teachers alike move at a quick pace to get all due assignments in before the grading window shuts, and the new one opens. But with that brings stress for both students and teachers.

During each nine-weeks, grades are compiled into a big heap of numbers which can benefit, or hurt, students lives and extra-curricular activities. Therefore, this adds a stress factor to everything that is done by the students and teachers alike by creating a sort of “rushed” state of mind for both parties.

“Kids in extra-curricular activities depend on their grades,” junior Curtis Evans said. Perhaps the idea of checking your progress four times a year for improvement is a good idea in retrospect, but a combined average throughout the whole semester seems like a good idea as well.

Who’s affected the most, you may ask? Students or teachers? Perhaps both, as students stress over the fact that grades need to be in by a certain time period. Or maybe teachers, as they deal with a flood of students, parading their classrooms with desires to change grades or request extra credit.

“Students are affected the most because we need to know what’s going on, what assignments we’re missing, and what we need to improve on,” Evans said.

Teenagers may think it’s all about them, when in reality, it’s about them, and their teachers. Ever heard of a kid passing without a teacher helping them along the way? Or even a kid wanting to pass without doing a thing? It’s just not logical. Both parties have to help each other to be successful and efficient.

All in all, the system of four different nine-week periods has its ups and downs. The fact that one of the “nine-weeks” is actually six weeks because of holidays is kind of a downside, but most upperclassmen have ridden it out ever since they were a freshman.