I couldn't do my exams again
'Tis the season of A-Level and GCSE results in the UK, something I find baffling. All the more power to those who managed to get through years of learning admist the worst possible time to attempt doing so. I honestly can't even attempt to wonder how, y'all are much more formidable than myself doing my exams.
I don't attempt to flex with my exam results. I did okay. I did well enough to get the opportunities of education I wanted, and then watered down whatever knowledge I did have in the world of media studies.
I am not Jeremy Clarkson. A man who has two decades worth of tweets saved for this exact season every year, actively telling us how much of a dumbass he is. You know, in life. Mans gets angry at the fact he couldnt get steak in a BBC cafeteria. I'd be more pissed off at the lack of turkey twizzlers, honestly.
But I digress.
I couldn't do my exams again. And I couldn't do whatever exams kids are doing these days. Exams for me were literally half my current lifetime ago and honestly these days I even get stressed at Buzzfeed quizzes hoping I'm not the wrong Ninja Turtle.
You see it on YouTube. Creators trying to do maths or science exams, generally barelling ahead before inevitably crashing into some sort of wall. You just don't keep a lot of that stuff in your head unless you use it in your current occupation or something. I learnt how to find the area under a curve in a graph, stuff about the renaissance, something about projectiles and friction, the entire history of medicine...I can't bust out that knowledge anymore. At a push, I'd get things right in multiple choice, but at the same time, I could also find out I'm Donatello.
Exams aren't useless. They're very specific to a very specific type of person yes, where learning and practise of that knowledge is key...but in other cases it's just somewhere where you drop off your short-term memory. I didn't study as hard as I could have for my A-Levels. I replayed a borrowed copy of Pokemon Red on someone's Game Boy Colour in the week lead-up to exams and whatever knowledge I needed to top-up before my exams was ingested literally 5 minutes beforehand, cramming right up to the moment of entering the exam hall.
Exams aren't getting easier either. If anything they're getting harder or, you know, fucked up because a pandemic messed up everyone's education. I can't fathom how kids have gotten through school without physically throwing shit across a classroom, or scratched graffiti into a desk that isn't theirs, or managing to distract a teacher their entire lesson, or the joy of a fire alarm. In exam years, all that random blowoff bullshit is necessary. Zoom backgrounds and remote learning ain't the same, so kudos to the fortitude of the teenager these last couple years.
There's a lot of cynical folk out there. You've got your Jeremy Clarksons, you've got your elderly think-pieces, you've got all sorts of punching down viewpoints from people who hate on the current state of examination and teenagers going through it, but really...Those people can't attach a file to an email without asking for help. Or even how to use Zoom. Or hold a phone for a FaceTime call correctly, or otherwise wondering why they're so small on their screen.
I envy the power and knowledge of each new year of people getting through their exams and into the next stage of their lives. Even TikTok has made me realise how fucking smart kids are at editing while filming and I still get frustrated at different frame rates in Premiere Pro.
To some, exams are easy. To others, the worst thing ever. Some people test well, some don't. I used to rush through my exam paper, imagine playing basketball in the gym as I waited for time to count down, then immediately realise I read every question wrong. The only exams really left in my life are whenever I get around to driving, but we'll see if I ever do it.
I couldn't do it all again. I couldn't expect to take in multiple different subjects in my mind and really be successful. I definitely couldn't have the fortitude of those who have done it through lockdowns. They deserve this summer. Freedom. Peace. Before it starts all over again.
In my A-Levels I got an A, two Bs, and extra qualifications my university didn't even consider. I'm now in a job adjacent to where I want to be, but I'm still generally happy with my life. But no-one's exam experience is invalid, good or bad. Except if you legit wanted a steak in a cafeteria, what the hell.
Or if you decide to blow off steam by being dicks in a cinema, fuck off to the park and do that shit. I respect y'all, but I'll still kick y'all out.