Students have many different aspects of their lives that could overlap. Maintaining a clear base of priorities is important for students. This can give them a goal to focus on during stressful times.

“My top three priorities are definitely time management. Just kind of having good relationships with everybody and doing well with my school work. Usually if there’s something in my social life going on then that may hinder my academics a little bit but not completely,” Bryce Kirchner, 12, said. 

What a student prioritizes commonly depends on what their morals are. These can be affected by different events or simply growing up.

“I feel like it is unique because everybody has different wants or different morals. It just takes time, trial and error, and figuring out what you want to do. [My priorities] haven’t shifted this year, but maybe next year…I hope to prioritize academics,” Kirchner said.

Choosing what to prioritize can be a long term or a short term process.

“I think a lot of students prioritize different things based on what they want to do in the future. For some people, academics aren’t important because they don’t plan to go to college and they like to have fun in high school when they can,” Adelyn Bauer, 10, said.

Priorities are distinctive for different people and they take time to figure out. 

“I think middle school is a great time to figure out where [your priorities] are. The kids that don’t really care I feel like don’t tend to do as well in high school, because they aren’t preparing themselves on how to study,” Bauer said. “I think my top priority will always be academics, but throughout the years, my friendships and stuff like that have definitely changed. Like drama, [that] is not a priority of mine.”