Exam Stress Stories

Exams are the best system to prove your educational knowledge to others outside of the system. If you think exams are stressful wait till you start work. You need strategies right now to deal with the pressure of exams, and this can be learnt.
Coping with pressure is a skill that can be carried over into real life. Just avoiding it because it is 'nasty' or not necessary does no one in the real world any favours.

Exam boards should be able to validate the integrity and rigour of their exams. That you as a candidate can indicate your personal knowledge of the subject under controlled conditions. The exam can validate your own work, not internet research or family involved input or someone else's copied or paid works. How does industry judge the calibre of its potential candidates if there is no faith in the exam system. By introducing their own exams? Defeats the object really. Why bother going to Uni if the study time is a time pacifier. Otherwise college and Uni is just one big babysitting factory. Exams are the best way of allowing candidates to demonstrate their knowledge and understanding of a subject and should remain.

The pressures of exams will always be there, and it it is up to the candidate to manage the stress they place upon themselves. That is not an onerous demand, and a demand that is placed equally on all students.

I don't agree that students "place stress on themselves", how on earth can you say that? Exams incorporate various pressures upon students, and many of them measure their sense of worth against others. I agree there are coping mechanisms available, but why have any coping mechanisms at all, when without exams-they wouldn't be weighed down with unnecessary stress?

Life is pressure, and the general workplace does pile heaps on pressure onto people, which they will need to prepare for if they want to work in those types of environment. Personally, I think all this stress makes life harder. It's great if some people can thrive on it, but I'm sure many also don't want it and would be better off without it-like me. I am not a fan of preparing and stressing about an exam beforehand, entering a room where I'll be allocated a table to sit on, then sit the exam by reading the questions and writing the answers; all the while the clock constantly ticks down, adding even more pressure and uncertainty were I not already riddled with it. Pressure, stress and expectations are a part of everyday life, but the force of which exams escalate those aspects is overbearing. What is it all really for anyway? So you can have access to the next stage of your educational endeavours?

So who is in charge of your own head? Someone else? Who puts the pressure on your own head?

Life is a competition, and no matter how much you would wish to shield students from that world competition - it exists.

Do you suggest everyone sits in their sofa and doesn't rise to any challenge, just wait for the welfare payment to come through? That way no one gets stressed at all, and if it gets too much there is always medication?

We are doing all students a great disservice by not teaching them how to cope with the pressures of life. That includes exam pressure. If exam pressure is the worst they will encounter in life then they are doing very well. If students have been taught well, have access to online support for revision, and have training in exam technique then that is the best we can do as a minimum? Otherwise, who is to decide who gets what job? What is the measure to say one student is better than another student? Or do you want every student to be selected on a lottery basis no matter what their level of ability is? Is this true equality when there is no selection?

The environment creates pressure. Some people can contend with it and some cannot. Parents, teachers and peers can induce pressure to succeed.

I'm not suggesting people shield themselves from pressure and stress, that's impossible, but I do think that exams and competition in general should be a choice not a forced commitment.

Again, some will thrive and want the challenges exams present, and others don't see what worth there is besides a lot of hassle that isn't needed. I've sat many exams and I don't think they've ever felt beneficial even if I got good grades from them.

Students like anyone else will find their way in life. If they gravitate towards pressure, then pressurized situations are for them, they can thrive in exams and get the jobs they want. Those who don't want the bother will likewise get what they want anyway. I don't support the whole one size fits all approach to education or life-because everybody is different, yet education doesn't appear to accommodate that. People get bored of education because the subjects don't match their interests, and if they're bored and aren't motivated, then as a result exams will be a waste of their time, even if it's an opportunity to get them further in life.