When most students think about junior year, they think about the horrors of what it is. Between SAT, ACT, AP tests and general pressures to get into college, junior year has been described as the worst year of all four high school years. However, through all of the stress and pains, I am thankful for junior year and the crazy stressful year that it is.

First off, junior year has taught me how to manage my time a whole lot better than before. Previously, I only had a little bit of homework, but when I started junior year, that changed drastically. I was working longer and harder after school, and I am sure that is the same across the board for current and previous juniors. This forced me to take a new look at how I was going to use my time and reorganize my entire schedule. I learned how to use my time more wisely than before and truly use my resources to the best abilities that I could use them as possible. Therefore, I give my first thanks to junior year for teaching me how to use time.

Next, it showed me how to get over making mistakes and that I will mess up along the way. Junior year is one of the biggest years students will mess up during their regular schooling. Between so much going on, it is easy for anyone to fall a little behind in even the easiest subjects because they have to focus their time elsewhere. I have had this happen to me during my junior year, and while it may not have killed my averages, I had to find ways to recover and fight through it. I had to find new ways to get around my own mistakes. Through this, I learned about my own resilience that was within me.

Finally, junior year taught me just how to deal with life and stress in general. Junior year can get tricky along the way and things can happen. As the adage goes, “Life happens” and junior year happens in the same way. Mistakes will be made and problems will arise. But, they will also be fixed and resolved, and we move on past them as we always have and will.

So, instead of looking at junior year as a horror looming over us that we will have to fight through which in some ways we will have to fight through them, the more important thing is that we use these experiences to grow ourselves and our skills because, when all is said and done, the grades will fade into the oblivion of the past, but the growth we undergo us humans and people of this world will stay with us into infamy.