Shawnee Mission Northwest High School - Lair Yearbook (Shawnee Mission, KS)

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TEACHERS OFTEN HAVE an in-class review to help students prepare for finals, Mr. Al Ringer explains a trigonometry problem to the Class. -photo by Brendan Ryan THE HECTIC PACE at which some students study often leaves them feeling tired. Mark Hummel falls asleep with his books while studying for exams. -photo by Marc Parillo Maximum Performance 23 design by Ruchi Aggarwa!

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---.-...www-Q-... Maximum Performance The final test Pressures from late nights studying build asjinals get closer As semester exams approached, some students panicked and feverishly tried to cram a semesters work into one night. Others took it in stride and studied without feeling anxious. I briefly glanced through old tests. a few pages of notes. and some note cards. Caroline Schrader said. but l was really nervous because I had never taken finals before. Several students and teachers thought that finals were not an effec- tive system of determining semester grades. I don't think finals should count as much as they do because if you work X i 1 . xx ., .X K ., . XXL X h. XXXL-I C- bt- I iq .h LQ . ll WN ' s ' ' ik iel'1.i'lllll it D.. l. , sn wt at SY -.E x t X ff 'kc X Xi ll? , ll Nh X' xxl X l ra N 4 f' l W . XX 'bex' 5 5- L , X XXX ,iliss x mx'-' 'T . RNSWS3 X f Xb 9' N ' ...-. X 4 lvl ' ' ' if A K i--..g-..-lglslige tb-.--ii? ' STUDENTS SOMETIMES FIND themselves studying late into the night. Elizabeth Ouseley prepares for upcoming finals. -photo by Marc Parillo 22 Academics hard all semester and you fail the final. your grade is all messed up. Jeaninne Wenzel commented. The opposing faction stated that finals were a method of determining the knowledge a person did or didn't gain during the semester. I think finals are necessary because they not only determine the students knowledge, but also help to find out how well the teacher taught the class. Jeremy Coulter said. Upperclassmen had an advantage over freshmen because they generally knew what to expect from the tests. The finals were really easy for me because I've taken them for many, years and l know how teachers sei them up. Christy Atkinson said However I did study for some finals because you never know how harc teachers will make their exams. The type of review also reflected the grades students received on the exams. Some teachers had a long. formaf review while others. like Mrs. King. only reviewed if necessary. Effective or not. finals continued tc be a problem for some and a breeze for others. -Ruchi Aggorwol

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Maximum Performance a .ft4:.f.,1.f.1.1.1tvs.-1..,.....,...,,-.Q-.-es:-1 1-1-.W-1-1,1-1-. .. . .. .. . . .. -s..,1.1+..M.1.f.aw. I lphabet oup The abbreviations for these tests could affect your whole life ' f .. Test after test after test is what many students found a high school education to be. You would study words then take a testg read a book, then take a test. The tests never seemed to come to an end. But standardized tests such as the PSAT. SAT, and ACT test, were one-chance tests that could reflect upon the future of the student. The tests were taken by most students, because almost all colleges required one or more of the standardized test scores for entrance into the university. The PSAT test was usually the first test taken during the junior year. The scores from the PSAT tests were sent to colleges and, depending on the scores, certain col- THE IDEA OF HAVING a book for everying seemed to be everywhere, even with stan- dardized tests. At any time you could walk into a bookstore and find rows of books on TGSTIVIQ- -photo by Marc Parillo AS TEST TIME came around, many stu- dents rushed to get testing entrance forms mailed in on time. As the entrance deadline nears, Jill Hamill completes her application forms. - photo by Greg Gloshen 24 Academics leges would send information to specific high school students. The ACT and the SAT tests could be taken anytime throughout the high school years. They were often used on college applications that required scores from cer- tain standardized tests. There were many ways of preparing for the tests. Each student that signed up to take one of the tests received a test book- let which had a sample test to study from. Books of all sorts had been written, com- puter programs had been made, and often teachers would spend time in class going over this type of test offering help to stu- dents. before or after school. to prepare for the tests. Before I took the PSAT this year, I stud- ied the student bulletin they gave me wher I signed up for the test, and I also lookec over the PSAT that I took last year anc studied my mistakes, Kristin Hruby said. On the other hand, some students didn' study for the standardized tests at al because they thought that the studying would not help their performance on the tests. l didn't feel that studying could help me because what l learn I remember lf I didn' know it then, l wouldn't know it on the test, Lisa Doten said. -Lora Smith WHEN STUDYING FOR standardized tests many students come up with all kinds o' study techniques. In preparing for the T test, Shawn Terrell uses an IBM SAT ' PVOQVHTTT- - photo by Greg ff .