Signing in and glancing back at the date of my last blog entry, I realise it has been a ridiculously long time since I have written anything. Well, since then, I suppose nothing of interest has actually happened. Life goes on, the school term starts, the school term ends, and then the cycle begins again. Unfortunately for me, this cycle has the added bonus of determining the rest of my life. Oh, the pressure.
VCE. The Victorian Certificate of Education. The acronym that evokes fear and depression in young teenagers like myself, every time it is uttered or a teacher drones on and on about how you have to do well and blah blah blah, it's in one ear and out the other. Quite frankly, it is a nightmare.
Like students before me, this two year course is a living hell. Each week builds upon the other, until finally, the exam period hits and it is BAM! BAM! BAM! Exam after exam after exam, until you reach the end and all that knowledge you have retained for God knows how long, is released and you can finally relax. Well, relax for a few days or so; because then the cycle starts again.
Another period of knowledge building occurs and then BAM! BAM! BAM! Exam period hits again, and you are stuck there in that room scrawling down everything you have learnt over the past year or however many months it has been since your last exam.
I myself have only just started this two year journey of self discovery. I have only just started the stress builder and knowledge overload. It isn't pleasant, believe you me, so I wonder how I am going to cope when I start year 12 at the end of this year. So far it has been okay, though in the first week of the year I found myself struggling. Why? Because I was stressing over crap that didn't needed to be stressed over. That and because I was doing two maths subjects (which was a complete drainer) which was already beginning to take its toll on me.
Now I am in my second term of year 11 (6 terms to go until it is all over!), with only six or so weeks until midyear exams. Am I looking forward to them? Well, no, not really? Am I prepared for them? Sort of. Considering that in little over 11 weeks, I have completed 2 Legal SACs, 2 Accounting SACs, 1 English SAC, 1 Methods SAC, 1 Chemistry SAC, undertaken a horrendous amount of tests and conducted an array of experiments, to say I'm 'sort of' prepared is ... well, suitable. Because it's true. I am only 'sort of' prepared.
But to be quite honest, the reason for that is because I am just way too lazy for this at the moment. Distractions are everywhere! Facebook, Tumblr, MSN, TV, this blog... If I don't learn to control this, I am going to end up crashing and burning when exams roll in. Oh dear...
VCE is a stressful experience. One that cannot be avoided. But what is it all for? What is all the hours of studying and repetition, pain and stress, for? Is it just so that we can sit for our final exams and be determined by a number on a page? An ATAR that means only to say that "Yep, you're smart enough for our university, you're accepted"?
As students, we are not distinguished by a number out of 100, or in this case 99.95 (what is with that?). We are distinguished by our achievements, our hard work and determination to strive for the number. We are distinguished by our friendships and downfalls, the periods when we feel like we have hit that brick wall and need to smash through it.
We are not numbers on a piece of paper. We are people. Bone and flesh and blood, breathing and breakable, and downright tired of being called a number.
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