College campuses are full of students who know they’re exhausted, but keep pushing forward like there’s no other option.
They stay up until 3:00 a.m. organizing notes, rewriting papers, obsessively checking grades and trying to include every club meeting or conversation into some future résumé bullet point.
Many know it’s unsustainable — still, they don’t stop.
Gen Z didn’t invent perfectionism, but we’ve created a version of it that’s more performative, more relentless and harder to escape.
It’s not just about doing well — it’s about doing everything, doing it flawlessly and making sure everyone knows. Even rest isn’t really rest unless it fits into a wellness routine or productivity hack.
This kind of perfectionism isn’t just tiring — it’s disorienting. The pressure to constantly be optimizing time ultimately forces you to stop trusting your own instincts.
But here’s the uncomfortable truth: some of the habits students are told to feel guilty about — slipping up, missing deadlines, dropping the ball occasionally — are the ones that create space for clarity.
The kid who bombs a midterm and learns to adjust, rather than collapse, may be more equipped for real-world setbacks than the one who’s never dealt with bad grades in their life.
People act this way because the expectations around college have changed. It’s no longer just about getting an education — it’s about building a competitive résumé, landing internships early and staying ahead in a crowded job market.
With so much pressure to succeed, students may feel like they have to fill every hour with something productive. Especially in the wake of the pandemic, an increased workload has been assigned to students to make up for lost time in education due to the online learning system.
The phrase “soft-quitting” has been a hot topic in the work world. Employers are becoming aware that their staff is doing the bare minimum to get by. Staff effort is low but it gets the job done.
While this may not be a healthy long- term habit, it might actually be a sign of intelligence. Maybe for students, some forms of giving up are actually strategic.
Take procrastination, for example. It’s a common habit, but sometimes it’s your brain’s way of pointing out that a task is not worth the effort you’re about to pour into it.
I believe that students who ask for extensions or admit they’re overwhelmed might be the ones who go on to successful thinkers who play powerful roles in their workplaces. This is because they are secure in saying, “This isn’t working, I need a different approach.”
That doesn’t mean abandoning standards. It means recalibrating what effort looks like and understanding that growth often happens in the margins. Growth happens in the moments where things slip and you figure out what to do next.
We live in a culture where productivity runs at the root of everything.
In the competitive world of academics, college students are rewarded — at least socially — for maxing out their course loads and curating a packed, high-energy social calendar.
But over time, that relentless pace can backfire, leaving you burned out, unsure of what you actually learned and surrounded by people you barely know.
I can’t help but think that this mindset will never really dissipate. With college admissions only getting more selective, these behaviors have even shifted into a high school setting.
Seriously, what 15-year-old kid should spend their summer trying to gain the most extracurriculars before entering their sophomore year?
What’s next? Middle schoolers?
Much of this ties back to how much slack we allow ourselves as growing adults. Young kids are expected to take on major responsibilities for themselves in a time where their brains are still developing. The pressure to be self-sufficient, productive and future-focused starts early.
As a result, childhoods are getting cut short by the push to grow up and prepare for the workforce — often before these kids have had the chance to figure out who they are.
College isn’t supposed to be a flawless trajectory. It’s where you find out what matters enough to fight for and what you can afford to let drop. For Gen Z students, it’s time to retire the idea that you have to do it all, all the time.
Embrace being young, not as an excuse to check out, but as a time to experiment, take risks and get things wrong without it meaning you’ve failed.
