FVHS students are getting ready for the end of the 2023-2024 school year’s first semester on Tuesday, Jan. 16. This marks the school year’s halfway point and where students’ second set of classes begin. Finals for current classes will take place Wednesday, Jan. 17; Thursday, Jan. 18; Friday, Jan. 19 and Monday, Jan. 22 for 1-4 period respectively, with a make-up day on Tuesday, Jan. 23.

On finals days, students will come into school as normal and testing will begin at 7:25 a.m. Testing will last for four hours and end at 11:25 a.m. Students have to remain in the testing classroom for the entire duration of testing, except for breaks, and will not be allowed to be checked out early. All exams will count as 20 percent of the student’s final grade. 

Seniors can be exempt from exams that don’t require state testing if they have less than 10 total absences and a final average grade of at least 80 percent for the class. This doesn’t apply to AP courses.

Many students are looking forward to the change that comes with the new semester and are excited for something different than the usual schedule. Freshman Ryan Santi confirms this.

“I’m happy to get out of math… I’m really interested in history, I can’t wait to take it,” Santi said.

Santi is also preparing and waiting for finals. He’s studying far in advance to get ready.

“[Finals are] scary, but I think I’ll do good on them… I like the format [of finals week] because we get to go home early,” Santi said.

Freshman River DeGrave is also fearful but confident for finals.

“It’s really scary because it’s 20 percent of your grade, but I don’t think it’ll be too bad,” DeGrave said.

Sophomore Rein Petit transferred to FVHS from Florida and is happy with WCPSS’s finals week format since it was much different at his old school.

“There’s one final each day here, but we had two finals each day in Florida, so you had to study for both and cram really hard,” Petit said.

Overall, students are worried but optimistic for finals, and glad that they get to go home early on final days. Students are looking forward to the schedule change that comes with the next semester, whether it be to get out of classes they don’t like, or just to experience something new.