Enjoy your time in college! It may seem that it is not as fun as you thought it would be – or that there’s no method to the madness they call college, but it does pay off!
This is the time to get to know yourself and determine what you want to do with your life. You will have time to think about what you want to do, whether it is become a doctor or teacher, travel to a third world country to volunteer, or start a non profit, and map out a plan on how to get there.
These are 10 ways to trim your budget. Basic budgeting will save you money and time in the long term!
1. Wash only full loads of clothes. Don’t waste your quarters by washing only one or two items. Bonus: Don’t use the dryer to dry your clothes completely – hang them up while still damp to save an extra quarter or two.
2. Take public transit, bike or walk. Not only will you save money from gas or car costs, but you will get some exercise and fresh air!
College students have a great, frequently free resource – campus gyms and exercise facilities! They also have access to health centers and on-campus counseling services.
While campus gyms are often better than those off-campus, sometimes you may want to beat the monotony of going to the gym with these free exercise videos!
Yoga Instructor Marcia Langenberg provides short, but effective Yoga training videos for download called Yoga @ Desk, that you can watch and perform at your desk!
These exercise videos are especially designed for people who work at their desks for most part of the day – such as students or computer geeks:
An important part of the educational process is learning how to form your own ideas about a myriad of topics and communicating them to others.
Typically, you will be asked to write essays or papers that communicate your theories and understanding of a particular topic. It can be difficult to get organized, but with these tips, you will quickly be on your way to becoming an excellent written communicator, as well as earning high grades!
No school year is complete without having a little fun. It can be difficult sometimes to coordinate everyone’s schedules when trying to go out to dinner or do a little clubbing. I have tried various methods – Evite, email, Google Calendar, snail mail, phone calls, etc. to figure out when to schedule a date, but nothing works as well as this option, in my humble opinion.
It does involve a little effort to set up (mainly to make sure the dates are correct), but after that, it’s a breeze! If you plan on doing a lot of socializing or want to plan something more regularly, take the time to do the entire year’s calendars in advance. 
Perhaps every student’s least favorite part of going to school is tests. In my experience, even a “good test taker” can take these tips from TestTakingTips.com and use them to get higher scores and great grades!
See TestTakingTips.com for additional study tips, including how to do well on certain question types, like multiple choice, essay and short answer.
Preparation for your first test should begin after the first day of class; this includes studying, completing homework assignments and reviewing study materials on a regular basis.
Reading is one of my favorite activities in and out of the classroom. Over the years, I have several methods to help me become a better academic reader versus a pleasure reader.
Some of these tips may seem repetitive or “common sense” but they work!
Remember – academic reading is different than pleasure reading in numerous ways, so you have to approach them differently.
Getting Involved, Staying Involved and Having Fun
Involvement is a key to being happy in college. And college is one of the few places you can try as many things as you want without consequence or spending a lot of dough. So why not try out all your interests? Why not join a few clubs and meet new people? Why not take advantage of the free movies, the free concerts (or low cost at least), or other activities your college itself or organizations team up to offer? Over and over again, research (and personal experience) has shown that students that get involved are less likely to drop out of college and are more likely to have higher grades and graduate from college.
Ok so I’m at college – where are the clubs and organizations?? Check out the student affairs website – there should be a listing of organizations or an office where you can go to get more info on the clubs and organizations. Many clubs and orgs put up flyers at the beginning of semesters to gain interest in what they do. Interested in watching anime? Try the anime club. Want service? There are tons of these groups around. Want to do something more local than a large national organization? Colleges have these too.
Let’s say you’re interested in what lots of the groups are doing but don’t want to stretch yourself thin – go to a couple events that those groups throw and decide which one you can give more time. Just because you’re not a member doesn’t mean you can’t go to their events. My undergrad institution had what we called “Club Expo” and all the clubs and organizations (all 300+) took over the student union to hand out info on their organizations and get interest lists together. Just because you have interest doesn’t mean you have to join. It just meant they would contact you when things were going on and give you space to make your own decision.
After spending 4 years in undergrad and 2 in graduate school, I have had to learn, sometimes the hard way, how to listen and take notes well.
These are tips that I also have passed on to my students this past year as I taught American Government.
The following 5 tips work, no matter what subject matter you are studying.
1. Go to class! There is nothing like going to class. Getting notes from your friend, listening to a podcast of the lecture after the fact, etc. just do not substitute for the real thing.
