Procrastination plays a huge part of a student’s life. According to theguardian.com, “an American study estimates that over 70% of students exhibit this behavior. Students are biologically and socially predisposed to put off until tomorrow what they should do today, due to the still developing prefrontal cortex.” The prefrontal cortex is a part of the brain located at the front of the frontal lobe. It is implicated in a variety of complex behaviors, including planning, and greatly contributes to personality development, which is fully developed when someone is 25. Most students, however, can concentrate well for about 45 minutes, according to teenshealth.org. Be aware, though, as a short break can easily turn into an hour wasted, as students tend to procrastinate.

In Millennium Brooklyn High School (MBHS), the teachers had their say about procrastination. Ms. Ciocca, an 11th grade American Lit and 12th grade World Lit teacher revealed that, “procrastination can affect students in 2 ways; some students can work well under pressure and submit quality work by the deadline, while other students don’t analyze concepts fully.” Unfortunately, the latter is more common with high school students, and this reflects in the student’s grade. She continued on by saying “the work isn’t high quality, so students won’t get high grades. The grades then don’t reflect their intelligence.”

In the MBHS student body, Agnes Griggs, a freshman, stated that “it’s pretty easy to avoid procrastination, but in our school it’s not too bad. The workload is manageable to finish.” It’s clear that, for her, procrastination isn’t really an issue. However, David Brown, a senior, revealed that “procrastination affects me greatly. I often don’t start my homework until after dinner and sometimes stay up late of getting up early to do it.” Additionally, he claimed that his “procrastinated started in middle school.”

Procrastination affects everyone at some point in their lives. However, students often are hit the hardest. Developing ways to fight procrastination early in life is a benefit that will continue on to adulthood.