5 Things You Can Do to Finish the Year Well

The following blog was written by Angelo DelliSanti, Principal of Carson High School.

We’ve arrived at one of the most anticipated times of the year for both students and teachers. It’s Spring Break! These are the days we get to sleep-in, visit family, go to the beach, or just enjoy the splendor of having absolutely nothing to do. Surely, it’s nice to leave your watch at home and turn your phone’s email application off for a while!

While enjoying every single moment of Spring Break is great, allow me to suggest that you take an hour of this special week and reflect about what you’ve done this year and what you want to accomplish during the fourth quarter. The time you spend doing this now, when it’s important but not urgent, will pay ten times the dividends of tackling things as they arise.

Here are five practical things that can help you finish the year well:

1.     Identify your goals. What is it that you want and need to accomplish before the end of the year? I bet a huge goal for every Senior reading this post is graduating on June 11. For teachers, it might be reaching that one student with whom you have not yet been able to make a connection. If you’re reading this and realize you don’t have any goals, make some.

2.     Update your calendar. Make a list of everything you have to get done before the end of the year and put it all on a calendar. Go to your school’s calendar and put all those important dates on your calendar, too. Oftentimes we don’t get things done because we don’t plan to get them done, not because we’re incapable of doing them.

3.     Focus on one thing. Think hard and try to identify the one thing that would have the greatest impact on your life if you changed it. This could be anything from a negative attitude to getting enough sleep. Only you know what this “thing” is. The secret to identifying it is being honest with yourself and choosing to make a change.

4.     Serve others. I firmly believe that some of the happiest people in life are those who make the decision to serve others on a regular basis. Build some time into your schedule to do something for someone else. If your gut reaction to this is, “I just don’t have the time.” think again. Everyone has time to help someone else.

5.   Take a risk and challenge the status quo. Oftentimes, the end of the year is so long because we keep doing the same thing we’ve been doing all year long. Change it up. Instead of giving the same test you’ve given for the past five years, identify a problem in the community related to your curriculum and give students the time and resources to solve it.

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