Students transitioning into higher education experience severe stress, especially when taking exams. Standardized Testing increases test anxiety, which consists of physiological over-arousal with impaired thinking of failure. While universities responded to the COVID-19 pandemic by temporarily dismissing standardized admission tests, some institutions are reconsidering the tests as admissions requirements. In addition, stress is highly detrimental to a student’s well-being, and standardized testing induces stress for students. Furthermore, the social attribution model helps explain how we engage with stress within external or internal environments. Empathizing and seeing all students’ humanity, hearts, spirits, and bodies is crucial. Therefore, institutions and their leaders who use a holistic critical mentoring framework empathize with their students and consider their culture and lived experiences when making decisions that impact the students. In this study, I explore symptom somatic disorders, which are body pains or fatigue symptoms that don’t go away, thus manifesting stress transmitted in the body and evident when college students stress over taking standardized tests. The literature review demonstrates the importance of advocating for the college student’s experience by integrating a holistic critical mentoring framework to reduce stress, provide resources for dealing with stress, and empathize with suppressed stress in individuals educational journey.
