Learn Spanish (Latin America): El profesor dice que el proyecto es súper estresante. - The professor says that the project is super stressful.

In colloquial Spanish, súper is added before an adjective to make an absolute superlative, meaning extremely or highly. Even though strict grammar rules prefer attaching it as a prefix without an accent (like superestresante), it is incredibly common in everyday Latin American writing to see it as a separate word with an accent mark, just like in this sentence.

Why do we use es instead of está when talking about stress?

We use es (from ser) because estresante means stressful, which is an inherent characteristic of the project. If we wanted to say someone is stressed (a temporary state or feeling), we would use estar and the adjective estresado.

Is estresante related to the English word stress?

Yes, Spanish borrowed the English word stress but adapted it to fit Spanish spelling rules by adding an 'e' at the beginning (since Spanish words never start with an 's' followed by a consonant). This gives us the noun el estrés, the verb estresar (to stress out), and the adjective estresante (stressful).

Why don't we use the subjunctive mood after dice que?

When decir (to say) is used to report a fact or share information, the verb that follows stays in the normal indicative mood, which is why we use es. We would only use the subjunctive if the professor was giving a command or expressing influence, such as telling someone to do something.