College can be a stressful time. No one knows that better than Brandon Moores, president of the fourth-year trustees. After conducting a class-wide survey, Moores and his fellow trustees discovered a startling statistic: one out of every five* members of the fourth-year class is, or has been at some point in their career at the University, “really stressed-out.” We aren’t talking about the oh-my-God-I-don’t-know-what-I’m-being-for-Halloween-stressed. This survey revealed that 20 percent* of fourth-year students are dealing with, or have at one time or another dealt with, the paper-due-Thursday-interview-Friday-midterm-Monday-stress.
“My Wednesdays are basically a wash ‘cause I have to go out Tuesdays in order to handle all this stress,” fourth-year psychology major Ryan Molhauen pointed out.** “And don’t even get me started on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays,” he added. “ I can’t get anything done four out of the seven days of the week because I have so much stress. Something is wrong here.”
The fact that two out of every 10* fourth years — that’s 40 out of 200, and exactly 500 out of 2,500* members of the Class of 2014 here at U.Va. — are exhibiting, or once exhibited, this type of stress is “alarming, to say the least,” noted fourth-year trustees vice president Haider Arshad.
“It may be because we are not as mature as these fourth years, or because we haven’t had as much time here at this university, but there is no way three out of 15* members of the third-year class have experienced this stress. I mean when we’re talking one million nine hundred forty two thousand one hundred and fifty two out of nine million seven hundred and ten thousand seven hundred and sixty* fourth-year students, the University has to intervene,” said third-year math major Mark McKirthy.
The administration is taking the challenge seriously.
“We as an administration need to come up with a compromise for the one fifth* of these stressed out fourth-years,” University Dean of Students Allen Groves said. “Therefore, we will allow this super duper stressed out group to miss a fifth* of their classes while still earning credit, drop a fifth* of their lowest test scores in a fifth* of their classes, and receive a refund of a fifth* of their tuition, provided they apply for these benefits before kickoff of the final home football game,” Groves explained.
The fourth-year trustees, working hand in hand with Groves and the rest of the administration, officially adopted what students have been calling the “Fourth-Year-One-Fifth*-Compromise” in order to help these stressed-out seniors.
“The two-tenths* of the fourth-year class who carry this weight, or at least know someone who has had to carry this weight, deserve a healthy outlet for their stress, and it is our duty as administrators to provide the three-fifths minus two-fifths* of the fourth-year class with such an outlet,” University President Teresa Sullivan said.
Ultimately this compromise will allow the how-many-more-extra-credit-write-ups-can-I-do-to-get-straight-A’s fourth years to become how-many-classes-can-I-fail-and-still-graduate fourth years, sources say.
“We’re really getting back to our roots here, thinking like Mr. Jefferson, in creating this compromise,” said fourth-year University Guide Felix Sneider. “I think the Fourth-Year Fifth*, that’s what we’re all calling it, really sets us apart as a University. It shows the world that, hey, we love our fourth years. We don’t want them to be stressed; we want them to have fun. When else in your life are you going to be able to do something like this, you know!? Go ‘Hoos!” he added, before returning to another new fourth-year body-image initiative that would allow students to run naked through the heart of the University.
*The Cavalier Daily would like to thank not-so-stressed-out-third-year-math-majors for their help converting these fractions.
**All quotations in this article are fabricated.
Chris Hutson is a humor columnist for The Cavalier Daily.
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