A lot of people have talked about having fun/parties on their last days before summer vacation. But when I was in middle and high school, we’d have our last day of classes and then finals and then whenever you had your last final, you were done. We spent our last day of actual classes prepping for our finals and then once finals happened that was it. Did the rest of you have to go back to classes after finals? And if so, did merriment ensue?
We had to come back for a half day after finals were over, for reasons that elude me now.
Shorts were forbidden at my school, but I figured “Fuck it - it’s my last day, what are they gonna do?” and wore shorts. A handful of other seniors did, too. We were all sent to the auditorium to sit out the remainder of the day. The principal had some cheek in him and turned the A/C up super high in there; I think it was about 55 degrees (I’m not exaggerating).
In some secondary, soft subject classes, we didn’t do much before the finals. Sometimes few people would show up and it was like a free period within the boundaries of a classroom.
For math, primary language and other such subjects, we just studied and some teachers would prep us for tests.
After the finals, I don’t remember anything being organized by the school. I do know that some students would have fun in the days following the finals but that was self-organized. They seemed to prefer having their post-school celebrations some time after 4PM, can’t remember precisely what the time was.
Junior high was different than high school. In junior high the last day was maybe an hour long. In 9th grade we skipped it – and got in trouble for it!
In high school we had finals after the last class. I hated that. It felt like taking classes in the middle of the summer.
When I was a senior, I somehow managed to not have any finals that took place after the last day. I spent the last period, a free period, in the music room, watching the clock tick away to 3:00. 2:59 was the longest minute in recorded history.
My most vivid memory of my last day in high school is of our Algebra III teacher leaving us in our classroom alone because he had to supervise the AP Calculus test.
I promptly took orders from anyone who wanted something from McDonald’s, drove to McDonald’s, returned with everyone’s breakfast, and enjoyed my McMuffin before moving on with the rest of the day.
My high school never had finals, so the last day of school was usually a Mass, followed by cleaning out lockers/turning in books, and killing time until dismissal at 12:30.
A close friend of mine had a (High School) Graduation Party at his house on the last day of our final exams. There were about 25 to 50 of us at the party, drinking beer, and generally carrying on. At the end of the afternoon, Aaron announced that his mom would be home from work at 5:30, and that the house had got to be cleaned, and the party moved elsewhere. It was discovered, shortly thereafter, that a certain local junky had overdosed on heroin at some point during the party, and was sitting, dead, with a needle in his arm and leaning against a tree out there in Aaron’s yard. Until then, we’d all assumed he was passed out, but since he was a couple years older than us, a known junkie, and wasn’t bothering anyone, we all had ignored and forgotten him. Anyways.
We told Aaron: “Johnny’s dead. He OD’d.” Aaron says “My mom’s gonna be home in half an hour! Get him the FUCK OUTTA HERE!”.
And so, with all the ceremony of tidying up lawn waste, Johnny was rolled up in a large piece of burlap, placed in the trunk of a car, and transported to the woods behind our high school. An anonymous tip was then called in from a nearby payphone, letting the local police know where to collect him.
You win.
Same.
Except senior year, if you had an A in the class, you were excused from having to take the final, and I had all A’s that semester, fortunately. So I guess my actual last day was just an ordinary day of class. Since seniors ended the year a week earlier than the rest, and the week before finals we had our senior trip, that would’ve still been a couple of weeks before the last day for the whole school, so nothing special going on at all.
:eek:
Oh yeah, I remember that happening my senior year, too. As long as our grades were decent. I think we had exemptions if we had taken an AP too.
Last day? Just waiting for it to be over so I could leave and never have to see any of those fuckheads again.
Drank some beer at the park over lunch, went back to take a History test and worried that my beer breath would get us in trouble.
That night went to a party at an abandoned airport, got ripping drunk and made out with some chick who never talked to me before. She asked for my class ring which I had to retrieve the next day.
I can’t remember high school, but my junior high school was quite memorable. The Mexican kids called it “Paddy Day”. The whole concept was that the Mexican kids would wander around in gangs and beat the shit out of every white kid they saw. Most white kids just didn’t show up. I’m asian, so fortunately, they didn’t do anything to me. It got worse every year, and the last year I was there, it sort of turned into “Paddy Week”. Several kids got put into the hospital with stuff like broken ribs.
I’m really not kidding about this. This was in a shitty part of L.A. in 1972. The whole fiasco was pretty much roundly ignored by the administration. I’m really glad I got out of there.
My palm flower was blinking red and black.
We had a form mass in the morning. Then I went around the school saying goodbye and thanks to my former teachers - I’d been at the school for ten years, so there were quite a few. Everyone left at lunchtime.
Junior high? Unless you had a ride, you were stuck there, so of couse you went around saying goodbye to everyone. I personally would always grab a bunch of pictures, something I’d been doing since sixth grade.
High school: class was over after the last final, assuming you actually had to take it that day, and the teacher hadn’t moved it up specifically because they had the latest one. As I said in the water guns thread, we were down to 30 people out of 600 by 9:30. We all just hung out in the lunch room, playing games and what have you, and taking advantage of the free sack lunches.
Even my friends that always stayed with me after school (due to all of us not having our own care and having parents that get off work late) found a way to disappear. Even I left after the free lunch and the other geeks had finished their Magic the Gathering game. (I never played, as I preferred to watch people who were good.)
My high school had a rule where if you were a senior and were taking 5 or more AP/IB exams, you were excused from the day of the first exam until the day of the last exam. And those classes didn’t have finals. So senior year, my friends and I were essentially done by the beginning of May and the weeks after that, people were mostly absent. The teachers did nothing. No exams, no classes. It was basically baby-sitting.
I recall the few days I was actually in school, we just sat around classrooms reading or watching movies. My AP Statistics teacher walked into class one day and said, “Here is the remote control to the TV. I will be at my desk. Don’t make too much noise. I think the Australian Open is on ESPN.” We did nothing. I think I had 20 absences that semester. The last day, we may have skipped and gone to IHOP. I don’t recall clearly.
Our last day of school each year was no different than any other day really. Till the 6th grade it only last half a day. In junior and senior high it was exactly the same. Only the vary last day for seniors in high school was different, we practiced in the morning and went home.
The last day at my Junior High always had an assembly just before dismissal, with a popular rock group or personality that no one wanted to miss, but was kept secret until the last minute. No one skipped that day.
We have penkkarit on the last day of high school. Students take matriculation exams in March-April, so they get approximately one month to study. Seniors dress up in costumes and ride around downtown in the beds of trucks, which are decorated with signs and slogans related to the coming exams. (Abi = abiturientti = senior. The white hats are student caps which you get after passing the exams.)
