By Kailee Austin

Senior Thesis!?!?! That sounds stressful. “Not going to lie on top of the rest of senior year, senior thesis, especially before deadlines is stressful. Definitely, the biggest alleviator of this stress is the amount of HL class and homework time is dedicated to working on and editing your senior thesis” says senior Brooke Kirk.

Still wondering what a Senior Thesis is? Senior Sama Allam mentions that the “Senior thesis is an incredibly long essay written by Tempe Prep seniors as a graduation requirement. Each senior is placed into a group, and each group has two assigned books to write their essay on; seniors get to choose their third book. After reading these three books, seniors craft a thesis statement and defend their point for about 15 pages. At the end of the year, seniors have to defend their thesis in front of faculty, which is the defense part of the senior thesis.”

Throughout the 7 years most students attend TPA, they are taught how to manage their time and meet deadlines. As you can probably tell, these are both very critical steps in the Senior Thesis process. Seniors each meet with their groups, alongside a faculty member, throughout the year.

Brooke Kirk states that “Seniors know what books they have by the end of junior year, and are expected to start writing in August. Our rough draft was due in January and the final paper in March. The defense is scheduled for April and May.”

One of the most difficult things about writing this Thesis is that “the deadlines come a lot faster than you’d think,” says Sama Allam. “Because seniors have to juggle school work and extracurricular activities daily, senior thesis work is not always in the front of their mind. Also, the theses seniors can craft based on their three books are surprisingly limited, since each group already has such niche themes, like jealousy or friendship.”

Senior Thesis seems like a very intimidating process, but Brooke says that with “how much help you get the much less intimidating it becomes. Your advisors, HL teachers, your peers, and whoever else you reach out to to read or edit your paper are all extremely supportive. Everyone wants you to succeed, and that is apparent throughout the process.”

For incoming seniors and underclassmen, Sama wants to remind you guys to “Read your books over the summer, and don’t procrastinate! Keep up with the deadlines or else it will be incredibly difficult to catch up. Senior year is a busy year full of college and scholarship applications, so it’s really easy to push your thesis aside, but I advise you not to do that.”

Brooke also says to “take notes while you’re reading your books, reach out frequently to your advisors, and talk to people who are not your advisors who can offer a new perspective. The more hands on deck the better! Your HL teacher is basically a third advisor, and they can be an amazing resource if you let them be.”

In the long run, the most important thing to remember is to manage your time and try to enjoy the process, Sama says. “It doesn’t have to be perfect.”