It’s that time of the year again. Halloween’s finally over and stores are annually pretending like Thanksgiving doesn’t exist by switching their decorations to the upcoming December holiday season. Yet for many high school seniors, for maybe the first time in their lives, the upcoming holiday breaks aren’t all that’s on their minds. It might be the beginning of the holiday season for some, but for college-bound seniors it is the beginning of the horrible wait.
With Early Action and Early Decision due dates flying by, high school seniors now have nothing else to do but wait. After years of preparation with the combination of schoolwork, extracurricular activities, and volunteer work, which were all done to boost their college application, these students cannot do any more. Yes, if they are applying Regular Decision they have to keep working, but the idea that the power is out of their hands can be either overwhelming or a sigh of relief.
The “Rolling” Applications have even made the process tougher. As some lucky students hear back from rolling college decisions during October and November, it makes other student’s situations worse. Even though people are happy for their friends, it makes the desire to be accepted even greater.
While some students are worried about “the wait,” others have already begun experiencing anxiety about their looming and unfinished regular decision applications. Libby Johnson says that she “has no time to pause and stress about waiting to hear back from colleges when regular decision applications are due so soon.”
The horrible “wait” might be only bad for some students, but it is part of most college bound students right now. Sometimes waiting can be the worst part of the whole process. The Brightside is that a year from now, we won’t even remember these struggles.