Senior spending through high school career is absolutely outrageous

Hearing constantly “Senior year will be your easiest year ever! Nothing to worry about!” I am here to tell you that little statement that is whispered into your ear from day one of high school, is a lie. A complete and utter misdemeanor of your life.

When you are a senior, the expenses are tremendous, out of this world and in a way, unnecessary. I am telling you from experience here, there is too much that people try and jam down your throats to buy. Save for college? No, save for senior year!

It starts freshman year. You get the option to buy a shirt that says your graduating year on it. You think it is pointless to buy that shirt at that time, you are a freshman you do not know what to expect, considering that is your first item you buy for your senior year. That is only because you get to wear it your senior year instead of a polo.

This repeats for sophomore year as well. Did I forget to mention the fact that you get a new shirt every year? Whoops.

During junior year, you spend money on a class ring. Yes, it’s pretty and shiny, but are you going to wear it when you graduate from college and have a job giving you the big bucks? No, you are not so why in the world would you want to spend $300 on a ring that you will only wear for a few years then probably put into a tiny box never to be seen again.

Now for the big kahuna, senior year. Towards the beginning you are supposed to attend a senior meeting expressing the new and cool shirts you can buy. Along with explaining to you the shirts that you have been buying since freshman year with your graduation year on them, are allowed to be worn any day of the week as long as from the hips down you are in dresscode. Whoop-de-do! If you calculate the total cost of the shirts through your high school year, at this point, that rounds to about $120. Yes, you just spent that much on t-shirts in the past four years.

No that is not too bad, but wait.

There are also the oh so lovely caps and gowns, yes those are essential to walk across the stage, no big deal BUT they also throw in the announcements, sweatshirts, sweatpants, a new long sleeve and short sleeve shirt, bracelets, necklaces and key chains. Yes, lovely isn’t it? If you buy everything that they show you in that senior meeting because you have one of those parents, that rounds up to be about $500 at most.

Oh yeah no big deal right? Hold on, it gets better.

Let’s just say you have parents who have to get a yearbook senior ad, which they’re lovely gifts to get from dear loved ones but if you think about it, the most expensive one is a full page which is $300. Then there is the yearbook itself. Let’s just say you got it before the prices go up, for $55.

Think I am done? Let’s keep going. Now, you need senior portraits taken; you want it done by a professional photographer. Their session costs around $200, then you also want a CD with the copyrights to printing the images so if you decide to print them you can, which you probably won’t. That ends up costing you at most another $500 depending on the photographer, but yes it is that much.

Surprising right? All this spending you have been doing for your senior year, the big shabang, is at most a grand total of $1975. That honestly, could have been put into a savings account for your college. You could have bought a month’s worth of food or possibly two months of rent in an apartment. The money you spent on senior year actually could have been put toward your future instead of one year of high school.

The ring will be tarnished and useless; the shirts will be outgrown and never worn again, the announcements will be thrown away; the pictures will only be looked at to remember how young you once were; the yearbook you glance at every 10 years to show your children what school was like when you were young; and you are down $1975 in the bank account. We only spend this much because in our generation, we have to have something tangible to remember.