MaxCoderz

I am a senior with senioritis, and I am wondering:

• Do you currently have "senioritis"? Is it a "real" illness?
• What do/did you do to cure yourself? Was it a permanent cure, or only temporary, to resurface again during college?
• If you do have "senioritis", is it affecting your programming motivation? If so, positively or negatively? How?
• Is senioritis good or bad?
• Are some countries/states/cities more susceptible to senioritis than others?
• et cetera...

I am asking these questions because I am looking to cure myself and my fellow senior class, but I am not exactly sure of the causes. Anyone mind to share their experiences/answers? Or is it just something that can only be answered with "just deal with it slacker, you'll get over it"?

TIA.

I nearly failed 12th grade because I never turned in any homework or did any classwork. I only did quizzes and tests.

I think everyone (excepting 2 or 3) in my class 'suffers' from it. And some of them will definitely fail their exams because of it..


as for me, I'm not going to do anything about it since I'm absolutely sure I won't fail my exams, they are quite easy actually so I'm not planning to learn. (in fact if I'd get a 4 out of 10 for everything I would still pass because I have 3 8's, 1 7 and 1 6 now, and we can have a 4 and a 5 in average if the rest is all 6's or higher.)

one of my friends has all 5,5's so he could get into trouble if he gets more than 1 5 for his exams, and I think he will.. but yea he drinks more beer than me so that was to be expected

little note: if you are not familiar with those numbers, 1 is the lowest, 10 the highest, 5,5 is required. But as I said before, we are allowed to have a 4 and a 5.

It's surely affecting my programming motivation, lol, I seem to have less motivation to do anything but I program more anyway because doing schoolwork is absolutely out of the question.

I think it can not be cured unless you're getting it in senior highschool, then you might get rid of it when you're going to do something you find interesting (say, you're going to study something that you like), but I wouldn't count on it.

I'm quite sure it's all a result of the boringness and uselessness of those far-too-easy schools (in particular those useless, time consuming yet easy assignments), really, I'm not doing a thing (only the tests really) and it won't matter. But I could be wrong..

I'm not a senior (I'm a junior), but I certainly am having these symptoms . I think I cured it by meeting up with a smart-ass freind yesterday who thinks he's so much better (and smarer) then everyone else. He has motivated me to start working harder then I have been these past few months (I'm actually studying for a test, which is unusual for me). By the way this kid is smarter (school-wise) then most kids, but he's an idiot when it comes to anything else.

When you are comparing something you should use "than" afaik, anyway, we don't you just 'contaminate' him with "senoritis-for-juniors" ? you wouldn't have to work so hard then..

Is it a "real" illness?

No, it's merely a phase or symptom in human motivation processes. It's just as normal as lacking energy after not eating well. However, that does not mean people can't tell you it's an illness to make themselves feel better in some way. Probably financially.

[*]What do/did you do to cure yourself?

There are various ways of dealing with the process. You can study flow and motivational theory and find ways to restructure your life to confirm to society's structure with a lessened presence of senioritis, you can adjust your views on society's life and labor structures and view senioritis as a message from your nature that you want a different pattern in life than society enforces on you, or you can choose for a variety of ways of making living with it more pleasant, or just suck it up.

I don't see it as anything that needs curing so I never did. It simply comes down to the enforced educational and labor structures being boring as hell. It's perfectly natural not to be motivated or do well at things that don't attract you.

You can treat the symptoms though. Turn your work in just in time. Or just enough work to pass. That's what I've done since 2 years before graduating high school and am still doing in my pre-final year at college. This way I do what society demands I do and still have plenty of time and energy left to enjoy the things that actually deserve to be enjoyed.

[*]If you do have "senioritis", is it affecting your programming motivation? If so, positively or negatively? How?

Yes and no. Programming isn't something I do for myself, I do it as work. Yes it slightly affects that, but I'm in a somewhat unique position where my work is entirely up to myself to complete as I wish and has to make way for college and social activities. If it wasn't my work I wouldn't be doing it all, so no it doesn't lessen the amount of programming I do. It's more subject to the structure of tasks in my free time than my motivation to fullfill them.

[*]Is senioritis good or bad?

It's bad if you think it is. I don't see procrastinating for example as anything bad. I just see free time as another task I spend more attention on than essentially useless things like overperforming at work or school.

Fact is modern life isn't natural so it only makes sense your body and mind oppose it in one way or another. I say, listen to them. I have no need to do anything but not fail college and make enough money to do the things I want to do, which is not making even more money or getting even higher grades.

NOTICE! The following is a public service announcement from the TI council. Senioritis is a contagious illness caused by the seniorenza virus. It can cause moderate to severe slacking, anxiety, and hair-pulling. If you have symptoms, the Surgeon General recommends a healthy dose of college and work-related comedies such as Animal House, Slackers, Clerks, Mission Hill, or Office Space; to remind you of how cool it will be after graduation.


Like 3fg, I get the occasional flare-up. There was an entire month where I didn't turn in a single assignment due to complacency (and my natural disgust for homework). This is my senior year in the Bachelor program and honestly, the whole 9 to 5 lifestyle seems exceptionally boring. Yeah, there's money, but where's the adventure and childish antics? I could see myself becoming like Hal in Malcom in the Middle and skipping work every Friday for go carting.

Freerunning always helped. Part of the problem is I've been so focused on college so much, I never planned what to do after graduation day. No direction. It probably wouldn't kill to try and map things out. Relocating, how to earn x-tra wealth, where to build the secret lair(s). You've gotta have direction in life.

Seriously, I used to be a straight A's kinda guy ... that ended the DAY i got my first TI-83 and realised that you could play/program games on them .

Office Space made me even MORE of a slacker. Great movie though.

Gambit wrote:

• Are some countries/states/cities more susceptible to senioritis than others?

I've never heard of it on this side of the pond, not witnessed any symptoms.

benryves wrote:

Gambit wrote:

• Are some countries/states/cities more susceptible to senioritis than others?

I've never heard of it on this side of the pond, not witnessed any symptoms.

Students don't procastinate in the UK?

It's quite common in the Netherlands though which is definitely on 'this side of the pond'

Ive never really heard of the term 'Senioritis' though, over here we just call it being slack/sick of studying .

threefingeredguy wrote:

benryves wrote:

Gambit wrote:

• Are some countries/states/cities more susceptible to senioritis than others?

I've never heard of it on this side of the pond, not witnessed any symptoms.

Students don't procastinate in the UK?

I'm sure some do, but I've never heard it given a name (other than laziness) or attributed to being a "senior". If anything, it's the young 'uns who don't have important exams coming up who are the slackers.

Americans like to label social inefficiencies as diseases, that's all.