Senior Lohitha Madhireddy compiled a report to study the stress levels of students for her AP statistics class, finding that lowerclassmen had the highest stress levels.

The data for this report was collected by surveying one homeroom per grade about the students’ stress levels for their math, English, and science classes during certain situations. These situations included taking a test, presenting, taking a pop quiz, working on a group activity, and participating in a group discussion. The students surveyed were asked to rank their stress level during each activity from a low one to a high ten.

“In AP psychology, we talked about how stress affects people, so I decided to do my project on it,” Madhireddy said.

Based on the average stress level of the four grades combined, Madhireddy found that the most stressful class was math. The average stress level of a math student in Algonquin is a 4.42 out of 10, compared to science student’s stress level of 4.31, and English student’s stress at 3.97.

“I’m not that surprised [that math is the most stressful] because it is a rigorous class,” Madhireddy said.

Data was not only collected based on academic classes, but also overall stress level by grade.

The data found that sophomores were the most stressed, with an average score of 4.54. Freshmen were the second-most stressed, with an average stress level of 4.51. Seniors ranked third with a rating of 3.97, while the junior class ranked at 3.91 out of 10.

“I’m pretty surprised that sophomores were the most stressed,” sophomore Jonathan Ludgate said. “I haven’t been that stressed about the year, and we don’t need to worry about college like juniors and seniors.”

“I’m not as stressed as I think I will be when I’m a junior or senior” freshman Ryan Dellapenna said. “There hasn’t been too much work and most people already had friends, so I’m really surprised that we had any stress.”

Madhireddy’s teacher, math department head Diane DeSantis has had students do this project for ten years.

“Some of the most interesting projects have been about the students at Algonquin, like Lohitha’s,” Desantis said. “Her project was one of a couple this year that was about students. One was about people’s reasons for taking AP or honors math courses and [another] looked at the absences of honors students versus CP students.”

Madhireddy admits that the results could be due to a small sample size, but she believes that there is something to be learned about the stress that students feel while doing everyday school activities.