Fourth quarter is really just spring break extended through a two-month period. It’s the prologue to summer vacation. It’s also a time when seniors just stop caring altogether. The beginning of the end is starting, so let the vacation begin.

The best thing about fourth quarter is seeing how new teachers have changed after their fist year. Seeing young adults come into their first job, excited to finally be educators, leave broken husks worn down by rowdy freshmen, is quite an (entertaining) experience.

Everyone starts behaving like they’re a year older during fourth quarter. Sophomores turn into juniors, juniors turn into seniors, and seniors revert to a state of perpetual kindergarten for the rest of the year.

Everyone starts getting sentimental during fourth quarter and starts crying when they realize the year is finally over. Then they realize that there’s really no reason to be sad because summer vacation is much better than senior year.

For seniors fourth quarter is a breeze. Colleges don’t even look at their fourth quarter grades, or so they think. Senioritis is a four stage affliction and it hits its peak at the start of fourth quarter.

There will be screaming, slacking, and general laziness filling the senior hallway in the coming weeks and we need to prepare for it. Juniors, don’t try to be seniors until the current seniors actually leave. We’ve come way too far this school year, just to fall back into the normal class warfare. Just let the seniors be obnoxious until their last day, then after that feel free to take over the senior hallway.

No one cares about fourth quarter because fourth quarter is a fundamentally flawed period of time. The seniors have been penned up for thirteen years and all they want to do is run free. We should put an end to fourth quarter and just turn the seniors loose after three. Who knows? Maybe they would surprise us and actually accomplish something worthwhile with that time, but probably not though.