Oftentimes, people will tell you that your junior year is the hardest and most important year of your high school career. We agree. Junior year stinks, but here are our experiences and recommendations for how to get through and maybe enjoy it!
August (Noah) - August is the easiest month of junior year so enjoy it while it lasts; it’s all downhill from here. That being said, this is a fun month as you get started with a new school year, new classes, and maybe some new activities and friends. It’s also a crucial month as it presents important opportunities to make any last adjustments to what classes, clubs, teams, etc. you want to commit to before the chaos of junior year overwhelms you. If you’re the forward-thinking type, you’ll use this time to plan out and adjust to how much time you want to devote to the different areas of your life. If you’re like most juniors, you’ll spend this time just trying to comprehend the mess you’ve just gotten yourself into, and maybe get yourself out of some of it before it’s too late.
September (Laynie) - This month is pretty much an extension of August, but now you actually have homework. It’s pretty easy to slack off, but if you don’t stay on top of your work it’s going to start to pile up really quickly and you definitely won’t be in for a fun final few weeks of the quarter. My advice: do your work early. It’s probably not super hard work, so just get it done. But aside from that, go to some volleyball games and maybe a cross country meet or two, and just enjoy yourself before October comes in hot!
October (Noah) - If it hasn’t hit you by now, this is when everyone realizes how much of a struggle junior year is actually going to be. Most classes will have some sort of end-of-quarter test/project that will make you question why you decided to take the class in the first place. At least you get fall break following that, but don’t take the word “break” too literally in this context because you’re probably going to be spending the week off school researching colleges (because that’s a part of your life now), trying to catch up on all the sleep you already lost, and working on assignments that you were supposed to have turned in before the break (not that I did that, just saying). Luckily, once you get back, Halloween’s only a couple of weeks away and that’s super fun. One drawback is that you are now officially too old to go trick-or-treating without people giving you stink eye (unless you have a younger sibling you can chaperone around, or just a random kid works too in a pinch).
November (Laynie) - NO SCHOOL NOVEMBER! Personally, my favorite month of the year. With almost no full weeks, November is definitely one of the best months of the year. But don’t let it fool you–November is still its own beast. With less time in class, you have less time to get your work done and more time to start stressing about finals. This is the best time of year to really dive into thinking about college–or not. If you don’t, it’s gonna really jump at you in the second semester, but it might still be manageable. One fun thing about November though–winter sports are starting! If you don’t have your sports credits yet, now’s the time! Join paddling! It’s definitely the best sport at Parker (not soccer), and you can get a full sports credit if you participate for your final years at Parker!
December (Noah) - Aka: Practice for May. There’s a good chance you’ll end up getting so caught up with finals/sports/having an existential crisis/clubs/survival that you’ll forget there’s a bunch of holidays coming up. Despite all the anxiety that can come with this month, if you can look past all the schoolwork you have to do you’ll end up having a fun time and getting a lot closer to your classmates as you all fight to make it to winter break. This month can also be a time when you start to realize that you’re getting close to being done with high school and that all the seniors you’ve known for years are going to be leaving even sooner. Especially once you get through finals week you start to see the light at the end of the tunnel of high school and have to figure out how to deal with that.
Also, kind of random, but at some point during this month a freshman will say something that makes you realize: 1) You’re kind of old now, 2) You were really dumb as a freshman, 3) You were not as dumb as these freshmen, who let them out of middle school?
January (Laynie) - This month is rough for two reasons:
1. You just finished winter break and you are definitely going to have an uptick in class work. APs are in full swing, and you’re not really going to want to accept that you are now a second semester junior.
2. January is the time when all the debate kids (myself included) start getting way too involved in debate, and likely won’t be able to talk about anything else for the next couple of months. We apologize in advance and invite you all to come out and watch us debate at the Neighbor Island Tournament because you might be able to get us to stop yapping about debate for a little while afterward.
February (Noah) - Hopefully you’ve got your motivation back from winter break by now because there’s not much letting up from now to finals. February in itself isn’t too bad, but starting now if you’re in a procrastinatory mindset it’s going to cost you for the rest of the year. Despite that, make sure you’re still having fun or you’re going to get burnt out way too soon. Spend time with your friends, go do fun stuff, relax a bit, and don’t stress too much if you turn in an assignment or two late, everyone does it. Also, if you haven’t started looking at college/after high school plans by now, you really should. It’s going to sneak up on you pretty quickly with everything else you have going on.
March (Laynie) - March is deceptively normal when it starts. You may think it’s going to be easy because you have spring break and there’s seemingly not a whole lot due. This is a lie. March is arguably the hardest month of junior year because all of your teachers are gonna have something in store for you that’s NOT going to be fun. In order to best survive March, you’re gonna have to really lock in and catch up from all the stuff you didn’t do in February, but also prepare for everything coming in the final quarter. Also, this is prom planning season! Help out the people on StuCo and get excited! I advise planning a barbecue prom because that would be awesome!
April (Noah) - As someone who has a 0-3 record against this month in high school (I’ve had to miss at least a week of school from getting sick every year) I’m not very qualified to offer any advice, so I’ll just recap what April will be like: exhausting. All your clubs, sports, and teams will be wrapping up their year or season so all of the most important events will be happening at the same time. Simultaneously, you’ll have to put up with all your classes ramping up for the end of the year. Especially if you’re taking APs you’ll have to be preparing for AP exams with everything else you have going on. This makes it difficult to balance enjoying the end of the year, pushing yourself in sports/clubs, keeping up with classes, and spending time with friends (especially seniors who are only a month from graduating now). So good luck figuring out how to deal with all of that and don’t let April get to you or it’s going to make May more painful than it already is.
May (Laynie) - Congratulations! You made it through your junior year, almost. The three weeks of school in May are the busiest out of the year with seniors gearing up to leave, AP tests looming, and everything else finishing up. I can guarantee that you will be taking at least one test a week–AP or otherwise–and it’s going to be a rough stretch. But you can see the light at the end of the tunnel, it’s almost over! And if you can make it through this month, you’re home free until the summer! Enjoy May, and go watch graduation. You’ll be next, and it’s great to go support your seniors!
Overall, we recommend you don’t overbook yourself and try to stay on top of your work (even though that’s definitely not going to happen), but also have fun and don’t forget that there’s a life outside of junior year. Don’t get too caught up with everything that you forget to have some fun and start planning for the future.