Results Day – it’s normal to feel nervous!

In my time as a student, I have endured three results days. Having arrived back from a festival only three hours earlier and surviving on very little sleep, achieving GCSE results that were higher than anticipated caused me to burst into floods of tears, and there’s a terrible photo to prove it. How embarrassing. A year later on opening my AS Level results, I tore apart the envelope, noticed that I was happy with the grades, and proceeded to chat with my friends in the college foyer.

Getting my A Level results

My third and most recent results day was the finale to a chaotic and entirely unexpected year, in which I was anticipating grades for A Levels that I had not in fact sat due to the coronavirus pandemic. Despite a sleepless night beforehand and the strong fear that I would not achieve the results to study a degree in Journalism at the University of Brighton, I achieved higher grades than needed and was entirely relieved.

It’s normal to feel nervous about results

For any student who has ever experienced the ‘joys’ of results day I am positive that we can all agree that the build-up and anticipation surrounding that long awaited moment can be incredibly nerve wracking. Each time I have held that long-awaited piece of paper in my hands I have felt such a variety of emotions. I knew that my AS Levels were simply a marker of how I was doing at college, but my A Levels were a different matter entirely – these mapped out how I would spend the next three years of my life. When considering this it appears that it is not the letters on the page that affect us so deeply, but their connection to our future.

Now perhaps that has absolutely terrified you, and made you feel even more scared than when you first started reading this blogpost. But that is certainly not my intention, and as an ardent overthinker I can imagine all the fears and worries swirling around your mind. It is a well-known phrase that worrying means you suffer twice, but it is so incredibly true. Whether you start biting your nails and allow yourself sleepless nights from the moment you put down the pen in the exam or an hour before you pick up your results, the letters on that piece of paper will stay the same. I have been told many times that feeling anxious surrounding something simply shows that you care about it, and chances are that if you care deeply about your results you would have put in the revision and work required to accomplish the best possible grades YOU can achieve on results day.

Clearing can give you more options

Those grades do not define you as a human being. If you under achieve, you will be supported through clearing. If you do well, then the effort you have invested will be recognised and celebrated. There are always options, and those letters have nothing to do with your worth or your importance as a valued young person.