Written by Katie McCarthy, with contributions from Amy Applegate.
The global pandemic we currently find ourselves in has connected the world through a joint sense of yearning. Workers are yearning to be back at their office desks, comfortably seated in their chairs and chatting with their colleagues. Primary school children are yearning to be back in their classrooms, playing with their friends and running around carelessly at break time. Relatives around the world are yearning for the hand of a loved one they have now lost to a deadly virus. And even the typical British family is likely to be yearning for their annual holiday to Spain or Greece, all now seeming very uncertain. Yet, no one would have expected that Year 13 students up and down the country would be yearning for their exams. Despite the intense level of stress, sleepless nights and loss of a social life associated with A-Level exam season, why is it that students are actually missing the very thing that brought them so much exhaustion and misery?
The announcement regarding school closures essentially changed my life in a matter of seconds. In fact, if I’m quiet enough, I can still hear the words of Gavin Williamson reverberating through my ears, and if I'm focused enough, I can still see the jarring 'Breaking News' bulletin flashing before my eyes. Rumours had been circulating through school corridors for a good couple of weeks beforehand: teachers advising us to complete A-Level coursework as quickly as possible for convenience’s sake, speculation about how exams would be conducted in the wake of social distancing rules and a creeping rise in the number of teachers who had called in sick out of fear that they had developed COVID-like symptoms. By Wednesday, 18th March the school’s eyes, watching over announcements that Scotland and Ireland had closed or were going to close their own institutions, had turned in on themselves - we were next.
But I still refused to believe that any provisions would be long term. I refused to believe that schools would be closed for an indefinite period and that my exams would be cancelled, so much so that I spent the hour leading up to Wednesday’s government briefing making History flashcards - hard work which, in a matter of seconds, would be in vain. Was this a reflection of my formidable certainty or simply my own disillusionment in the face of the true facts? Schools across Europe were falling like dominoes. It was only a matter of time, therefore, that English schools would fall too.
Sixth Forms and Colleges across the country spend two years preparing us for the most important exams of our lives thus far, the exams that will supposedly determine our entire future. The stress, work-load and constant nagging are drilled into our brains to such an extent that we are only able to think in academic terms. By early March, life only seems to be revolving around exams and everything else falls short of importance, making it inevitable that any A-Level student will be hard-hit by the fact that their hours spent making flashcards, writing essays and completing past papers were wasted hours.
It was natural, then, that I proceeded to cry and sob uncontrollably once the announcement was made that all GCSE and A-Level exams, set to take place in May and June, were cancelled. Not postponed. Cancelled. Perhaps my reaction was a little melodramatic (a lovely, not-at-all-embarrassing photo below shows just how far-reaching my breakdown really was. Okay, it really is quite embarrassing, but I find it necessary in getting my point across) but, in my head, it was the only appropriate way to respond to such a devastating loss. I have always been an incredibly hard worker and have continuously struggled to learn my academic boundaries. Revising for two hours can very quickly become six, and an invitation to a party or get-together with friends is immediately counteracted by guilty thoughts - that my time would be better spent completing a past paper for German, writing flashcards for History or enriching my critical appreciation for English Literature. So, in this split second, it was not only my exams which were cancelled. All the hard work, sweat and tears that had gone into the most important two years of my entire education had equally been wiped away from view. No one would ever hear about my German research project on the country’s journey towards democracy, nor would any examiner ever get to read my History coursework on Russian repression.
For the average unmotivated and sleep-deprived student, having your exams cancelled and your summer begin prematurely probably sounds like a dream. It’s really the kind of thing that only happens once in a blue moon. Hours spent in front of comprehensive textbooks, straining computer screens and ticking clocks in the exam hall were replaced with unlimited Netflix streaming, guilt-free lie-ins and, to put it simply, blissful freedom. Yet, this was not our reaction to the situation at all. Although there were some students who were genuinely happy to be done and dusted with their fourteen years of education without having to sit a single A-Level paper, our unprecedented, final day of school on Friday, 20th March can only be described as bitter-sweet. In our makeshift Leavers’ Assembly, my Head of Sixth Form spoke with tears in her eyes as she attempted to get the speakers to work in our auditorium, but in the end we were forced to watch our Goodbye Video in dead silence, without the emotional music and fitting lyrics of The Wanted’s ‘Gold Forever’ blasting through the sound system. I think this moment is really a testament to how unplanned and unexpected the whole situation was - not even our school speakers were ready to say goodbye to us!
So, perhaps the reason why we are missing exams so much is because exam season symbolises so much more than the final step in our secondary education. Exam season equally symbolises the end of seven amazing years with incredible people and the beginning of a new phase in our lives where everything really begins to change. Exam season symbolises the jubilation on Leavers’ Day, where students are handed their Leavers’ Hoodies and, as is the case at my school, dress up in hilarious, sometimes borderline-inappropriate costumes in a school-wide Leavers’ Parade. Exam season means saying goodbye to those teachers who believed in us when we didn’t believe in ourselves, it means prom is approaching, and it means that we are about to begin what so many students call the best summer of their lives.
Our reality, however, now looks much bleaker. Our holidays are being cancelled, nightclubs and pubs are closed (an absolute catastrophe for the average intoxicated teen!) and we can’t even meet up with friends in ‘normal’ circumstances (sorry, Zoom, but you just don’t quite cut it). And, whilst still trying to get over the fact that our final months at secondary school have been taken away from us, we are bombarded with the expectation that we should be using this time as productively as possible: learning a language, growing abs or even mastering a musical instrument.
For weeks, we waited in angst regarding the uncertainty of school closures, and then, on that fateful Wednesday, our questions were answered. But now this dread and uncertainty have spilled into questions over university. Will Freshers' Week be postponed or even cancelled? Will universities be online for the first semester (as of writing this article, Cambridge University announced yesterday that all lectures will be online until the summer of 2021)? Will students be able to move into accommodation and begin making friends, or will the social side of university (and arguably the most exciting part of first year) be postponed too? Our education has been replaced with one large question mark. Naturally, there’s a lot for us to be worrying about, and a zoom call with friends or a socially distanced get-together in a public park is about the only way that we can reach out and talk through these worries. These methods of social contact may help, but they certainly don't cure.
For the most part, our lives as students could definitely be much worse. We now have the freedom to enjoy daily rounds of exercise, sleep in until midday and utilise that Netflix membership like never before. We choose, therefore, to keep quiet about our issues and complaints. Why should we complain about missing out on prom when key workers across the country are exposing themselves to this invisible killer without sufficient PPE equipment? Why should we complain about our cancelled holiday to Nice or Zante when hundreds are surrendering their lives to COVID-19 every single day? And why should we complain about having to complete our first term of university from the comfort of our own homes when others live in perpetual fear of becoming unemployed and losing everything that constitutes their livelihood? We don’t want to come across as selfish. Everyone is losing out at the moment and this just happens to be our loss. We all deserve the chance to grieve over what could have been.
My friend and fellow Year 13 Student, Amy Applegate, also shared my feelings of sadness and guilt:
In an effort to placate ourselves to the current circumstances, many students, such as myself, are struggling to come to terms with the fact that, not only are our exam results uncertain, but also the renowned 'best summer of our lives' seems to be materialising into a six-month period of simple 'family time'. Many Year 13 students across the nation are currently attempting to suppress their anger, sadness and FOMO of what should have been. When frontline workers are risking their lives and exposing themselves to the horrific number of Coronavirus cases, the 'losses' of Year 13 students are seemingly reduced to a mere 'there are bigger issues in society than cancelling your holidays'. But why are we made to feel as though what we are missing out on is insignificant? This only comes down to guilt, which we feel for comparing our loss of clubbing, for example, to the countless deaths belonging to this global tragedy.
Having endured many, many breakdowns and endless hours of work and revision, the only thing that kept students going was the knowledge that what many teachers, family members and friends called 'the best summer of their lives' was upcoming, yet now this appears 'cancelled'. It's not just the material aspects of holidays, clubbing, festivals and prom that we are missing out on. It's the chance to make memories with our friends before we all separate on our individual paths to adulthood. It feels as though our last moments of childhood have been robbed from us by a global and unprecedented pandemic - something that an in denial Amy, even a few days before the cancellation of A-Levels, would have never dreamed of happening.