It’s the weekend before you come back from break, and all you can think about is finals. You wish you took the finals before break so you could come into break done with tests and no homework and come back into school with a clean slate. But instead you have to come back to school with no memory of what happened two weeks ago.

Be honest: how much did you forget over break? Probably a lot. A study by the National Summer Learning Association shows that 66 percent of teachers have to spend three to four weeks re-teaching students course material. Finals should be before break because many students lose knowledge of what they learned after break and have to relearn it all for finals. Whether it’s relearning all the equations for Chemistry and formulas for Algebra or having to remember the motifs in Lord of the Flies for English, these things are extremely hard to recollect especially after two weeks of not practicing it. If we had finals before break, we could get all of the testing over with and come back with a fresh start.

Break is a time to get away from school things like homework and tests and projects. We shouldn’t have to worry about finals throughout break; we should be relaxing and taking some distance from all the stressful papers and essays and tests we take at school. But no. Instead we have to study, or else we forget everything that will be on the test. The point of break is to, well, take a break! Simple as that. But it’s hard to take a break if your mind is set on tests.

How many of you went on vacation over break? Wherever you went, whether it was a sunny vacation to Hawaii or a trip to Whistler for some skiing, you didn’t want to be stuck in your hotel room studying – you were having fun with your friends or family. Or even if you stayed home, you should’ve been away from all the stressful thoughts of school.

We should come back from break with a clean slate, a new start, and new grades. If finals were before break, then we could come back to school confident that we would do better in the new semester. I mean really, how hard is it to move test to two weeks earlier? We hardworking students deserve a fresh start to the year and a new semester. We should be relaxing over break, not dreading finals that are looming overhead.