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Senior Izabella Olszewski rose to valedictorian of the 2023 senior class while maintaining involvement in the school community.
Izabella Olszewski is a hardworking student that is admired by her peers. She manages to balance her school work, extracurricular activities, and hobbies all while maintaining her position at the top of the class.
Currently, Izabella is taking three AP classes (Calculus, Statistics, and English), one honors class (Physics), and three elective classes. She is also a Tennis Captain, Treasurer, and Vice President of the National Honors Society. At the beginning of her highschool career she was not trying to be at the very top of her class. She says, “It was always my goal to do well in school and maybe try to be in the top 10, but I wasn’t really aiming to be this successful and be number 1.”
Izabella uses time management strategies in order to maintain her grades, time with friends, and extracurriculars without stressing herself out. When she is making plans with her friends she also plans when she is going to do her school work around that. She says, “However, if I have more homework, big projects, or tests coming up than usual, I will make sure to stay home and work on that instead. I only do what I know I will be capable of doing so I don’t stress myself out too much.” In school, she finds it is very important to pay attention in class and to not fall behind on work. After school, if she is tired, she will take a nap or spend time with her friends and family. Izabella usually does her homework and studies at night before she goes to sleep. Izabella says, “Earlier in the year, I had club meetings after school about three times a week, but now I just have tennis practice/matches almost every day after school. I still go to the clubs when I can.”
Izabella acknowledges the stress that school puts on students and says she manages it by, “taking small breaks and then trying to get back into being productive. A lot of the time my coping mechanism would be to sleep in order to avoid the work, but eventually I just have to go back to the work because it will stress me out more if I don’t get it done.”
Izabella’s advice to underclassmen is, “If you want to be successful, you should take school seriously, but not to the point where it consumes you. Allow yourself to still have fun and do the things you want to do, because if you don’t, you’ll just be stressed and burn yourself out anyway. Also, if you are ever struggling or need help, reach out to your teachers with any questions or extra help. It can really do a lot and also form good connections with them.”
After high school, Izabella plans to go to college at UConn and majoring in accounting.
