Warmer temperatures and spring weather aren’t the only things drawing seniors out of class; there’s also the senior slide. Senior sliding is a phrase commonly used to refer to seniors losing motivation to do their work and doing worse in school. Senior Summer Wang believes senior sliding is unavoidable. “I’m not gonna lie, it’s inevitable,” she said. “Especially second semester senior year when it’s your last semester of high school, and you’ve done everything that you could.”
“I feel like for the first semester of senior year people are mostly missing school because they were stressed from college applications and then second semester is almost like the relief of being done with your college applications and you just want to be done overall,” she said.
Getting accepted into college also plays a large role in students becoming less motivated at school. “Once you get into college, or you’ve heard from your top school, or as soon as you know that you have a future, I feel like something kind of turns off in your brain that’s like, ‘Oh I don’t need to try as hard now,’” senior Noah Hecker said.
However, support and encouragement from teachers helps students stay focused in school. “When it comes to my favorite teachers, [saying] not to [slide] helps a lot because I don’t want to disappoint them or have them think less of me,” Hecker said.
To another point, getting aid in the form of scholarships or merit based aid is a great motivator. “[Scholarships] give me motivation because in order to get scholarships, you have to keep your grades up… and I’m also getting the reward of scholarship money,” Wang said.
If you’re currently a senior who’s sliding, it’s time to refocus. “Push on the downhills, just keep pushing, keep going hard, and keep trying to get your grades solid,” Hecker said.

This piece was originally published in Zephyrus’ print edition on March 27, 2025