By John Mahoney and Tee Haskell

Photo credit: Tee Haskell & John Mahoney.

Every spring, an unexpected phenomenon hits the Senior class. This phenomenon is known as Senioritis, which is defined by Google as “a supposed affliction of students in their final year of high school or college, characterized by a decline in motivation or performance.” A team of Match journalists ventured into the Sharp Café during an E period to figure out when Senioritis hits Collegiate Seniors and why it happens. 

Dylan Callaghan (’26) said that Senioritis started creeping up on him during the spring of Junior year. Already knowing where he wanted to go to college and what he wanted to do after, Callaghan started to focus on classes that he deemed more useful for his future. As for the other classes that he thought were not going to be as useful, Callaghan did not put in as much effort as he should have. Lastly, he admitted that the rigor of Junior year and balancing all of his extracurriculars burnt him out and made him even more ready to leave for college.

For Addison Purcell (’26), the Senioritis bug hit her relatively recently, after winter break. After getting into college in November, she felt a small decrease in motivation to do her schoolwork. While her motivation may have dwindled a bit, she made it clear that her motivation is keeping her GPA at a respectable level for the rest of the year. Like Callaghan, she finds that she gets a boost in motivation in classes that she finds extremely interesting, like AP Comparative Government.

On the other hand, Jackson Vance (’26) said that Senioritis has not impacted him because of his fear of his acceptances getting rescinded at the colleges that he has been admitted to. Also, Vance feels like he needs to be locked in to keep up with the rigor of his classes.

Considering all of the Seniors interviewed, it seems that Senioritis is something that many Seniors feel, but it is not as much of an issue as many teachers may think. While motivation may diminish, most Seniors feel compelled to keep their grades up throughout their second semester.