As students know, this is not an average high school and the kids roaming these hallways are not average high school students.

The pressure to be different from all 4,000 students who attend this high school (or maybe just the 25 kids in your history class) exists deep in the roots of excelling.

After asking 100 students to name three New Trier-related stressors, the number one answer was college. Senior Robert Kennedy explained these results: “Because kids want to go somewhere that makes people say, ‘wow, that’s a good school!’ But not everybody gets to go to those places.”

According to Kennedy, students consider their path after high school a reflection of themselves. This ideology can make students take drastic measures to achieve.

Other categories of pressure mentioned were homework, tests, and grades. All of these, most frequently tests and homework, would be considered stressful if the goal in mind was to do perfectly. Which it is.

Sophomore, Shermeen Kazemi said, “Where you go to college depends on how you do in high school; it [stinks], but it’s true.” She explained that homework, tests, and grades determine a student’s future. This would lead anyone to be anxious at any high school. However, students at New Trier seems to feel a higher level of anxiety due to high expectations from parents, teachers, and peers.

Whether it is the stigma of North Shore excellence or the control of parents, New Trier students bear many external pressures. “Students get stressed from the rigorous curriculum, [but] also from their parents,” Ryan Rafeyan states. Students may also feel personal stress to do well. “…students just tend to put a lot of pressure on themselves,” Laura McCormick, a senior, said.

Surprisingly, the results of the survey showed that homework is more stressful than tests. Maddy Sacks, a senior, said of the outcomes of the poll, “I think homework is more stressful because it has more of an immediate effect. Homework is something you have to turn in the next day, while grades are something you see only once a quarter.”

Afternoons during the school week are considered very stressful for students as well. However, New Trier, again, pushes it’s students further. Many Trevians do not go straight home at 3:25, but have play rehearsal, a sport, or a club.

Completing homework can become a stressful task, when partnered with so many other things in a student’s life. We have an extremely competitive athletic department and an equally incredible theatre department, which leads students to spend hours after school, not doing homework.

“The homework is the testing of your knowledge and also typically harder than the classroom work.” Ella Harris, a junior said. “So, it’s stressful to be tested on practice work, thinking you need to know it perfectly.”

Beyond academic stress, there is the stress that comes with being a teenager. Youna Byun, a junior, said social stresses may directly affect school work. “Besides academics, definitely socially [I get stressed] because you always want to fit in and go out with friends, but sometimes it doesn’t work out.” These stresses could devastate a student’s academic life.

Still, are all of these stresses worthy of our stress?

“I think stress is very common at New Trier because we go to such a competitive school,” said McCormick.