Sometimes midterms seem like another set of tests to remind us just how much material we don’t remember. From Wolfpack football to fall break planning, we can think of a hundred things to do that would be more fun than trying to solve the practice problems we’ve mentally already given up on. But, as much as we’d hate to admit it, midterms are inevitably important. 

I have the same initial reactions as every other student on NC State’s campus. Just hearing someone say “midterm” makes my stomach flip faster than Gabby Douglas at the 2012 Summer Olympics, and the amount of tears I’ve cried from being overwhelmed makes the Amazon Rainforest look like a desert. There’s a negative connotation associated with the word that we all created as students. Frustration. Fear. Failure. Hopefully those are the only F-words that come to mind. But do they still have to be so bad?

In reality, “mid”-term suggests that you’re halfway through the term! Now that doesn’t sound so bad, does it? The glass is half full, and you’re well on your way to the end of the course. No matter how you look at it, though, saying goodbye to the course doesn’t mean you can say goodbye to everything you learned in it. You may have needed that knowledge to pass the exam and to pass the class, but you’ll still need it after to succeed in your career. 

Will it always be directly relevant? OK, maybe not. We all have to take gen eds, even if it puts a pain in our side as we add them from the “Enrollment Wizard” on MyPack. Let’s be honest, they always seem to be the ones that ruin our otherwise perfect schedule. You might never have to recite the exact date of a historical battle as you help build an airplane at your aerospace engineering job, and I’d be surprised if you had to take an indefinite integral as an editor for a local magazine. 

Be it directly relevant or not, having all the knowledge of your well-rounded education will only enhance your understanding of the material that you do use every day. I recently changed my major from numbers to rhetoric. I don’t exactly find myself calculating the velocity of falling objects or conducting titrations in the chemistry lab anymore, but the STEM concepts I’ve learned during the years have greatly influenced my way of thinking and are always evident in the analytical, organizational and logical aspects of every writing and speaking assignment. 

One of the best ways to retain information is to practice accessing that information. We all know it’s in there somewhere; you just have to be able to get it out somehow. Say you’re in the doctor’s office diagnosing an illness. Pretty sure if you tell your patients that you have to “Google it really quickly, just to make sure,” they will walk right out the door and never look back. Ever. 

It’s one thing to study the material to master it for a test. Students, however, have the habit of learning that material for the test, and only for the test, before letting that newly obtained information slide straight to the back burner. Sooner than later, you’ll forget it’s there altogether, and when your next consecutive course builds upon that material, you’re back to square one. Studying that information for a midterm exam encourages students to label those theories, and definitions and calculations on a more urgent, significant level. 

So hang in there this week, Wolfpack. We’re all in the same boat (so don’t let it sink!) this month with midterm exams creeping up in every class. Just remember, they don’t have to be a bad thing unless you make them one. You might have to take a second, or third or 11th look at those practice problems, but it’ll pay off in the end when you get that new job with a white lab coat because now a first look is all you need. Lions and tigers and bears aside — just try your best. It’s a test that is meant to help you.