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Crunch time for Lake Zurich high schoolers
Robin Knickerbocker, Scott Godsey and other students study for finals on Monday at the Ela Area Public Library. | Dan Luedert~Sun-Times Media
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Updated: February 19, 2013 1:34PM
LAKE ZURICH — The school year is almost half over, which means it’s time for mid-year final exams at Lake Zurich High School.
With finals running from Tuesday, Jan. 15 through Thursday, Jan. 17, some high school students took advantage of a day off on Monday to get ahead on studying at the Ela Area Public Library.
There, the library hosted a ‘Cram for Exams’ event for students from 3:30 until 8:30 p.m. As a service to area teens, they provide an designated room with tables of chips, water and soda for studying students.
“This is a nice extra room to study. It seems a lot of kids are coming here,” said Michelle Bourgeois, Teen Services Coordinator for the library.
“They’ve done this program before at Ela, but this is my first time as the teen services coordinator,” she said.
Many students took advantage of the opportunity to hunker down at Ela.
“We’re studying trigonometry and physics,” said Charlie Filipiak, a high school senior. “Mainly physics. It’s just a lot of equations.”
While some teens said that although they would like to study for all their tests, Monday’s cramming was mainly for finals that would be on Tuesday or Wednesday.
Senior Rachel Methling, who had finals the following day, said she was studying for English and physics.
“Those are probably going to be the two hardest ones,” she said.
Methling said physics would likely take her the most time.
“There’s a lot of work involved in finding the answer, even if it’s multiple choice,” she said.
Although teens have been using technology more and more to aid in their studies, students at Ela on Monday had textbooks and practice sheets spread out on the tables. Some used a calculator app on their iPhones.
“I only have one final, but I’m a little worried about this one,” said senior Mason Meicher, who was at the library studying for an Algebra II exam.
Erica Christianson, Head of Popular Materials at the Ela Library, said the library usually tries to facilitate teens studying every time finals roll around. She said about 50 teens took advantage of the study room on Monday afternoon. Christianson said there were also students throughout the library preparing for their big tests.
“We do have a lot more teens in the library studying at this time,” she said.
Christianson said she usually sees many students throughout the year at the library, but final exams bring a different level of focus among the students.
“It was all final-oriented as opposed to project-oriented,” said Christianson of Monday’s program.
