Growing up in high school and becoming upperclassmen is exceedingly busy since students take on many responsibilities. Some responsibilities may include going to school, working a job, and even playing a sport or being a part of an extracurricular that Air Academy offers such as marching band.

 As a student, taking on the initiative of having to work, go to school, and play a sport can be a lot to sustain. This is why time management, self-care, and self-drive are incredibly important skills to develop to help students balance tasks,

“Using every possible opportunity to get what you need to done helps have good time management,” junior Henry Stockton mentioned. 

Having good time management skills is important for balancing many activities in your life. Being more focused on one specific task and planning time to get it done is key. Taking advantage of every possible opportunity will benefit students to prioritize their tasks and achieve their goals faster. For example, students could use study halls, KAT time, tutoring services, extra credit, or even extra work time to enhance their productivity. 

Using those times will help students stay on top of their academic game. This comes in handy when students have other activities after school and have a limited time frame. Good time management also helps students work smarter not harder so that they get more work done in less time, even when time is tight and pressure is high. 

Although creating a good schedule helps students progress with skills of time management, students may get extremely stressed when having to manage many tasks. During that time they experience tension when being pressured of managing many activities at once. This feeling of stress creates anxiety for students and it can become excessively overwhelming when not taken care of properly. The effects of stress can be detrimental to a student’s mental health. The feeling of stress can cause students to not get enough sleep, have low energy, low motivation, and can even impact behavior. 

Students need to understand how self-care plays a significant part in our lives and everyone’s well-being. This especially applies to those students taking on a job, a sport or activity, and going to school,

“Self-care is important to understand because when taking on many responsibilities you must take care of yourself first,” Counselor Rachel Archer explained. 

Self-care is about making priorities, setting goals, and making self-care a habit or routine that you have even when you are feeling good about yourself. For example, when students have to work, do homework, and attend a sporting event on the same day they must introduce practices of self-care to cope. 

This decision should be based on them personally not on others like students teachers or coaches. Some might put their schoolwork and job first, whereas others might put their sport as a more important priority. An example of self-care is setting goals. Making goals such as academic goals, goals in a sport, or even personal goals push students to work harder and accomplish their goals.

Students should not only have good time management or good self-care but self-drive is also critical to balancing schoolwork, a job, and extracurriculars. A student being able to persevere, demonstrate tenacity, and overcome setbacks is self-driven. By having these different skills students have adapted while having busy lives, which has not only helped them manage their time but has prepared them for the future and what is to come.