Syracuse University has finally decided to jump on the fall break bandwagon by making Thanksgiving break a full week off. While most students are jumping for joy, academically, this break could harm our GPAs and work ethic.
Enter: post spring break, something that is actually harder to deal with then a three week hiatus from Glee. It was a huge challenge forcing myself to get off my plane from Florida and it’s an even bigger challenge trying to do work. I find myself making excuses as to why my homework didn’t get done, tweeting about trying to study more then actually learning anything and sleeping through classes because I’m up all night watching Netflix. Clearly, I have spring break fever.
I personally depend upon my fall grade point average in order to balance out my overall GPA. I do this because after spring break I usually check out and don’t care much about my work, as stated above. But, with fall break, I may never do well academically. Let me explain, I’m not a nerd and would honestly love the time off but I like having three-day weekends during the fall. I’m able to allow myself to have a nice break throughout the semester while still staying in school mode. By having fall break the university will no longer allow certain religious observances to be considered official school holidays. Thus, say bye bye to three-day weekends.
By having fall break students will basically follow this cycle: head back to school, almost three full months of schoolwork, a long week off for fall/Thanksgiving break, back for finals. No one will be motivated to do any work, ever.
Smaller breaks psychologically allow the brain to collect information, process it and store the information in an efficient manner. By having frequent breaks that proceed longer than a few days, students more likely to forget information and go into vacation mode.
Inconsistency in an academic setting forces students to become lazy and forget information. While fall break may seem like a blessing, it in fact could more bad then good.