James Bowie High school prides itself on its amazing fine arts programs, extracurriculars, and the dedicated students with the discipline to juggle these activities with their school work. But, when does it become too much? Are these programs too exhausting on students?
Fine arts are rigorous on students, and should offer more leeway for students. I find this true especially for later in the semesters with final exams and midterms on the schedule.
All of these programs have very extensive time expectations, and the time dedicated can take up entire weeks. Fine arts programs especially are known for their schedules taking up even weekends. All of this can leave very little time to get homework and assignments done.
Some students say that their fine arts take up so much of their schedule they don’t have any time to themselves. Even if they manage to balance school life to extracurricular well, some have no free time for other leisurely activities like hanging out with friends.
Fine arts are known for also being very strict on students meeting times. Conflicts are problems, and if you are sick, even for a day, everything can pile up way too fast. Sometimes, conflicts can even get you denied from a program.
Final exams, midterms, major projects, are all things that take massive amounts of time. Students need to study, work, and on top of all of that maintain good grades. For students to balance all of this, they may need to sacrifice one thing for another, like sacrificing social lives for fine arts and grades, or sacrificing fine arts for social lives and grades. This is stressful on the student to have to make choices about what they value more.
Some people may say that people know what they get into before joining the program, but at some point staying at school all weekend from morning to night, it can get stressful. While it is important to know what you can balance, people shouldn’t have to be pushed into a position where they have a tight line to walk.
I would suggest giving students more grace to get work done, or cutting back on everyday and weekend rehearsals to leave students time to breathe between their schedule. This could make life less stressful for students who love their fine art, but need time to get work done.
Fine arts are wonderful opportunities for students to connect with peers, be a part of a community, and build skills for life, but they shouldn’t be their whole life. It’s important to know how much you can take, and it should be more important to be able to have free time and study time beyond just school hours.
