Give West Brook students exemptions for their 1st semester exams. This brings down our stress levels for our harder classes. This also gives us more time, especially seniors, to focus on other courses, college applications, and scholarship applications. We need to maximize our time on where it is needed. Should we present sufficient knowledge and skills over the course of the semester in a given class, we should not have to take an additional assessment to prove our grades. With stress levels so high to get into college with money to afford our furthered education, the last thing we need is 7 more tests to stress about.

The incentive to attend school to receive exemptions is now gone as we, the student body, no longer feel the obligation to attend school any longer than the base requirements. Bringing back our exemptions will give back the incentive to achieve high attendance rates alongside the incentive to work harder and achieve good grades.

After having been told for an entire semester that we were expected to have exemptions this December, the student body has come to anticipate these exemptions. Therefore, taking away these exemptions only a couple weeks before test week has both enraged us with the district's ability to grant and repeal exemptions so easily and disappointed us with this false hope in the district's sympathy for the student body.