Final exams are coming up for students at Grosse Pointe South causing stress for teachers and students according to Mr. Shawn McNamara, Earth and Environmental Science Teacher.

Students have mixed feelings about final exams but some like Gretchen Brockway ‘19 are feeling stressed out.

“I’m really nervous about them because it’s a really stressful week. I know some people have trouble with testing and get nervous but I think if you study you can get whatever grade you want,” Brockway said.

According to some seniors like Savannah Jambor ‘17 the stress level isn’t as high.

“I’m pretty okay with it because if you pass all four quarters you don’t really have to worry about it. I take all my education seriously, but obviously being a senior and wanting to be done does factor into how serious I take them,” Jambor said.

Students all study in different ways according to Mr. McNamara, but he says the best way for students to study is for them to do practice tests.

“That doesn’t mean online quizzes necessarily, that means have someone quiz you. Have another student or parent actually ask you quiz questions. Another way is to teach the material to somebody,” Mr. McNamara said.

According to Mr. McNamara some students cram for tests instead of studying which is not a good habit to get into.

“The notion of studying is sometimes misunderstood because sometimes students interpret that for cramming. When do I think you should start studying? When you start learning the material. If you truly learn the material then there is not as much to study and  you don’t have to study as much.”

Final exams are not a measure of someone’s overall grade but they do reflect how much someone has learned according to Mr. McNamara.

“I think it is good to have a measure of how much someone has learned over the course of a semester. At the end of the week you might take a quiz on a small set of topics and you might show that you understand those topics but if you took the same quiz a month later would you get the same score?” Mr. McNamara said.

As a teacher who teaches all grade levels Mr. McNamara says the thing helping older students most is their experience with exams.

“I teach all four grade levels and I wouldn’t say there is one that does better. Maybe my older students tend to do better just because they have had the experience,” Mr. McNamara said.

Students and teachers alike have mixed feelings about final exams but according to Mr. McNamara final exams are a good indicator of a student’s learning,

“It does measure long term learning as opposed to taking a quiz at the end of the week,” Mr. McNamara said.