It wasn’t long since I was once in my last year of high school. We’ve all waited for the moment where we can finally leave and move on to an institution that eats up all our money, drowning us in debt. But who cares right, just as long as we leave this hellhole of a place we’ll be totally fine.   Since it’s senior year – the last freaking year of high school we want to end it with a huge BANG! Everything you’ve missed out on the past three years, you want to just shove it all in one year. You’d have high expectations for senior year thanks to media depictions of it. Though, something that my friends and I never accepted was that every high school movie/television plot is based on American high school life. We live in Canada, bro; we don’t have kick-ass homecomings or prom. Coming from experience, please, my dear seniors or seniors-to-be, do not, in any circumstances, try to imitate High School Musical 3’s Senior Year plot because it will just go down hill. Do not hype anything because as we know when you have high expectations for something and you don’t reach it…it becomes a huge disappointment.   Here were major problems that my friends encountered during our last year in high school and just failed miserably.

1. Unable to distinguish fantasy from reality

This was the biggest problem my group of friends face and probably the root of all our failures. For starters, I came from an all-girls high school. So already, “the dream” was far from possible. There we no guys walking around except for male teachers and that’s probably it. Our biggest problem was adding males in to the equation of having the best year of our lives. I remember clearly: it was September, the first day of Yearbook class. That class was in a computer lab so we can work on the Yearbook, but that never really happened. Only a selected few did. The rest (my friends) were on Pinterest creating folders of dream prom dresses, hair, makeup and even dates. Yes, we created a fantasy, which was why we had astronomically high ass standards for the prom dates we will choose, dresses we will be wearing and prom itself. All we talked about was prom, prom, parties, and prom. Our teacher got so sick and tired of our discussions that she separated us all.

2. More time consumed for social events than university applications & grade expectations

You’d be surprised at how many students give up by the end of the year. My school, especially had hella high standards. Our work was on university level that if we asked university students for help they’d be like “I never learned that yet”. Our curriculum was intense which was why everyone’s marks dramatically decreased as every test mark came back. And we got used to it. But, when applications for university came in, we all started to panic. Why? We were so focused on social event for senior year that we had difficulty balancing our time. It was even more stressful when everyone else was getting early acceptances except for you. That’s when you’ll realized, “I fucked up senior year BAD”. So children, please take your marks a lot more seriously than other things because you’ll thank your future self.

3. People get salty and bitter AF

With the stress of exams, applications and ISUs, people tend to get extremely stressful that they reach their breaking point. They’ll probably start snapping at everyone and become bitter. People become salty assholes who think they’re better than everyone and can snatch all the acceptances and underestimate students who have lower marks than them thinking that they can never get in to a university. Well, if you ever get to this point, take a step back and realize how bitter you’re sounding. Just push your pride aside and admit you’re actually happy for the person, don’t be negative, it’s not healthy. That type of attitude follows you in the future. Everyone just becomes an asshole and everyone loses their chill. Survive it all by dodging bad vibes from those people. Also, there will be a period in senior year where the waters are calm…then all of a sudden you’ve got one girl calling another a bitch and a snake. Then you’re in for a tempest.

4. Over-hyping: Are we going to prom or hell?

I touched upon this in number one. My friends and I thought that prom would be the pinnacle of our senior year that it’ll be “the night of all nights” (lyrics from HSM3). Guys, just one word of advice: do not hype it up. Don’t hype up prom, after parties or anything. It’ll lead to a series of unfortunate events. If you’re asking, I went to both – prom and hell. Actually, prom was in hell. Don’t want to dive in to any details but if you followed what I’ve said previously, your prom will be just fine. Do the following:

• Do not fret if you have a prom date or not, I realized it’s not even a big deal if you bring one or not
• Don’t stress over promposals either…they’re never like the ones on the internet, nope
• Embrace the moment, I never got to do that because all of my friends were stressed as hell
• Do not consume your time just taking pictures – dance and talk to people
• If you’re going to plan an after party, make sure it’s fool proof or make it small, big parties don’t work (TRUST ME)
• Order a limo. Do not branch out from that mode of transportation or you’ll be surprised with a circus bus. Just order a nice Hummer limo whether it’s expensive or not, just do it.
• COME TO PROM EARLY – my friends came late, we missed the photo booth, the hors d’oeuvres and nice prom pictures on the stairs.
• It’s not a bad idea to rent a hotel room to get ready in and crash in after a party (optional)

5. Ending senior year on a bad note and holding grudges

There was drama during my graduation with some old friends. Honestly, when I looked back on it, it was stupid. We could have had a peaceful and less awkward ceremony but because we acted so childish. You’re graduating high school and if you still act like you just entered just when you’re about to leave, you won’t survive university. Don’t hate those individuals you had problems with forever because you’re not in high school forever. Apart from those horrible things I’ve mentioned, obviously some good things came out of it too. I became close with many people during senior year and got even closer to my best friends. I realized that I am grateful to have reached the finish line with genuine individuals who will walk the same path after high school and straight in to the real world whether it’s college, university or work. I just want future seniors or seniors to know that high school isn’t like HSM or any other show out there. No, you may not find your Troy Bolton you may not have experienced a football game with cheerleaders on the sidelines and turnt after parties, prom might not be like what you see in the movies and you might not get in to your dream university/college. But that’s okay because like I’ve said before, high school isn’t forever and that’s not what life is all about anyways.