Anxiety. The Oxford Dictionary describes it as “a feeling of worry, nervousness, or unease about something with an uncertain outcome”, however if we think about anxiety for long enough we will find that it is actually so much more than that.
Anxiety is an unstoppable growing feeling of lack of control, a feeling of sickness and over the top panic. No one knows how many students struggle with anxiety in ISB, but should we be more aware?
It is not a secret that we students have a lot of school work, homework and responsibilities. This is not a bad thing. Having responsibilities will help us grow as people and become more independent, but the important matter is how we deal with the workload.
According to Calm Clinic, a website that helps people who are struggling with anxiety, there are numerous negative ways to cope with anxiety, such as “reckless behaviour”, they also state that “your own mental coping skill is still your strongest tool”.
When asking students their opinion on how ISB manages anxiety and how they help their students with the stress and pressure, there were many different opinions. An anonymous source stated that they “favour people who are good at school and do not realise that their workload is sometimes too much for students to handle”, they also mentioned that it is incredibly difficult for students who are doing the full IB and have numerous large and important assignments due in for the same week.
Another anonymous source commented that “ [if] you sign up for as many [electives] as you can handle then [you will] be fine,” however she then went on to say that “the school is [quite] intense about stress and anxiety, they make a big deal out of tests, and essays and that is really stressful and the only thing that relieves that stress is doing them”.
Mr. David Anderson, the school psychologist, gave me a larger insight as to what can cause and relieve stress and anxiety. I asked him what he thinks can cause anxiety within students, and he replied to me with a list of things, such as “performance demands and social demands.”
I also asked him if he thinks ISB handles anxiety well and if he thinks school work and homework can contribute towards it, his response was that “there are some people who deal with anxiety very well at ISB. They are organised and they do not procrastinate. They exercise regularly and get enough sleep.” He then went on to give ways to calm anxiety, such as “[avoiding] over scheduling.”
Mr. Phil Bowman voiced that “Anxiety in students is usually caused by daytoday stress that builds up over time. This could be stress from home, school, and/or relationships”.
If you are struggling with anxiety or stress, there are different strategies that can help calm you, such as “[taking] a short break when you are feeling stressed and watch something funny. You will forget just how anxious you are when you start laughing”, he also said that “If you find that you are dealing with high anxiety, do not try and tackle the problem(s) alone.
Talk with your counselor or a teacher you feel comfortable sharing your frustrations with.” The most important thing that he said however is to “make time for family and friends. No matter how busy we can get, there are certain people in our lives that we need to keep in contact with.”
Sleep deprivation is something that came up frequently when asking about anxiety, Mr. Bowman even sent a link to a website that gives reasons as to why sleep is so important, the website gives people more detail to the consequences of losing sleep.
Anxiety in a school like ISB is going to occur often, students are being pushed to the limits in order to reach the high standards of the school, which in the future, is going to benefit us as people. In the present time, however, the stress and anxiety that ISB can put on us students can be hard to deal with, we just need to know how to handle the pressures of life.
Lily G
