Stay Home from School to Save Your Sanity

Going to high school day after day can be an unrelenting proposition, especially if you’re actually trying to pass. With the periodic table to memorize, the Spanish-American War to pretend to understand, and Moby-Dick to skim for phallic symbols, it’s easy to fall behind, especially if you also want a social life.

One of the most popular techniques for managing the pressure of the high school grind is to internalize the stress until you break down both emotionally and physically. We at SparkNotes feel this coping method is, in the parlance of the day, totally freaking wack. Here's our alternative: When everything simply becomes too much, stay home from school.

Now before you run and tell your parents that some web site excused you from learning for, like, ever, please hear us out. Like in Swift’s A Modest Proposal, you need to read our scheme carefully to understand the nuances. After all, this isn’t an easy trick to pull off. But if you’re game, here are some tips for selling the idea to your parents:

Remember: You are not trying to deceive anyone.
The first thing you should know is that we are not recommending that you 1) pretend to be sick or 2) skip school and go hang out under the bridge downtown. That’s JV stuff. This is about preserving your mental health and doing better in your classes, so we encourage you to be up front about your motivation.

Plan ahead.
In case you haven’t noticed, people tend to be grumpy in the morning. This includes your parents, who are forced to work to support your uncontrollable texting habits. You may not want to spring your brilliant idea on them five minutes before they head out the door. Instead, pick a choice moment to relay that you are feeling stressed out and getting a little behind on your studies, and you’re wondering if you might take a day off next week to catch up, "if you need it." Who knows, they might be feeling the same way and take the day off with you.

Adults do it all the time.
Building on the previous point, when you have a job, there are things called “personal days” that allow you to blow off the daily grind on a whim. And you still get paid! (We're not kidding: These days are given to you by your company, along with your flame-resistant body suit and GPS implant.) Students should have this option as well. Exercise caution when using this as part of your argument, lest you run into every parent’s go-to reply, “When you’re an adult, you can do whatever you want.” (Note: Sadly, this is not an actual privilege of adulthood.)

Pick a good day to do it.
If you’re going to miss a lot of important work by staying home, choose a different day. Also, don’t stay home if you have a big test or paper due. Duh. It’s too obvious and people will think you're just lazy. Which you might be. Just sayin’.

Don't forget the all-important follow-through.
The best way to show that staying home is helpful is to be productive. In addition to enjoying the lack of pointless torment and getting to eat a lunch that wasn’t stored in a metal tray for five hours, try to accomplish something school-related, or better yet, several things school-related. Resist the urge to watch crappy depressing midday television or surf the crappy depressing midday Internet. The worst thing would be to take a day off and then go back to school even farther behind, in which case you’d really be up Poop Creek without a paddling device and it’ll be your own fault, so don’t blame us.

What do you think? Would taking a day off save your sanity?