To All starting college for the first time

[LynnJuniper]

I know there's a few, so first I want to say Congrats to you all, you've made it this far this is where the fun begins.

Now , Last year when I started college I did (and still do) a few things that made it kinda misrable, so I'm going to give some tips

1) Don't look at all the syllabuses you have and freak out. It tends to manage itself over time. Make sure you know your due dates, but don't flip when each one says "Read a chapter a day" Its rarely if ever that bad. in college you get a lot of free time between classes or you get out early believe me , there is time, speaking of time

2) don't think that just because you started college that suddenly you'll be working 300% Harder and all your free time is suddenly gone. The later isn't really true (until finals or the nights before papers are due )

3) Get to know your professors. Introducing yourself to them , making a good first impression may lead to connections that can help you later with jobs internships and other reccomendations

4) Relax, Have fun! Make friends!

[Fatherchaos]

Having started, finished/graduated, and started again for even higher degrees, I have to concur with Lynn on her above points.

The only thing I would add are two points: If you are given an assignment, start it immediately. It is much easier to work casually for two weeks before something is due, and have a week to relax, then to work like a starved crazy monkey two nights before a major project is due. If you can start anything early, do.

Secondly, don't be afraid of the financial aid office and Fafsa.ed.gov (if your a US citizen). The financial aid offices that got me through my early years of college proved nothing more than friendly and exceedingly willing to help you. You'll be surprised how cheap/free college can get if your are really down on your luck. And there are great programs like work study that can let you turn your student loans into repayment via working at the campus.

Having now typed all this, I recall one of the most critical but least obvious routes to success in the classroom. Don't be silent. It took me a few years to really understand that you as a student are not there to silently absorb the lecture and study your notes, etc. later. This caused a bit of a conflict with some of my early classes. Engage your teachers with any questions you have. They may rib you for silly things, like being the fifth person to ask when a project is due that was just announced and written on the board, but you'll find that most instructors actually enjoy it when you have a question. Not only that but by asking questions you get to use those other parts of your brain and recall important information that you may not have understood more readily.

Oh, and mabey even experiment taking notes in colored pens - I've done that to great success.

And now that I'm still at work I should probably focus back on my duties, toodles!

[LynnJuniper]

Yeah that's another one.

Note taking (for me) was a bunch of busy work in Highschool to shut us up. I now know better.

Its no joke in college man, just bite the bullet and take notes

[ycleption]

Always remember that if you talk regularly in class and raise your hand when you know the answer, not only will you be engaged and learn better (and, depending on the class, get a better grade for having participated actively), but when you are lost and don't know the answer to a question, the prof will be so sick of hearing your voice and decide not call on you.

[ShiffDrgnhrt]

Also...  DONT sit in your room all day playing Layo... Or WoW....  Or Guild Wars.....  or Oblivion....  Or Age of Empire....  Or....

[Eight-Bit]

If you can, and you teacher will let you, bring some way to record them speaking if it's a lecture. That way you can take better notes later.

If the teacher won't let you, hide the recording device.

Oh, and don't be the know-it-all that is never right. Every single class has atleast one of them, and you don't need to be it.

[Falonthas]

put it on your laptop and play in the sunny quad instead
fresh air is best for layo

[LynnJuniper]

xD Hah, I got by the last two semesters just fine (4As  4Bs and one C but that was math so it was expected), while playing WoW and Layo lots.

[Fatherchaos]

I had a semester where I played layo, wow, guild wars, and eve online. I nearly learned my lesson that those are not study materials

[miltonyorkcastle]

I got through undergrad by playing the "beat the professor" game. If I wasn't terribly interested in a course but I had to take it, I didn't bother learning all the material for it. Instead, I would just learn what the professor liked the most, and hang onto that for dear life. Usually, the professor, seeing my apparent adoration (sarcasm here, folks) for the same interest he/she had, would subsequently give me an A (seriously, the poor sods would really think I was into the stuff. I'm shameless, writing papers I completely didn't agree with to get an A in the class). If it was a math class, then the trick was simply discovering how to beat the professor's test designs. Finally, if it was a class I was actually interested in, I would spend twice as much time working on that course than all the rest of my courses for that semester put together.

Now that I'm in graduate school, I'm interested in every course I'm taking...... *gulp*

[Kirbiana]

Being of the been to college/graduated/graduate school/taught description, I'd add:
 
 Be leery of "you can play all the Layo/WoW/Whatever you want and do fine" advice.  Tailor that to your needs.  Some classes/majors/students require more focus on schoolwork than others, and you can very definitely flunk out of college by spending too much time on these things.  I've seen it happen -- and did it myself with PnP D&D about a million years ago.  So you have been warned!
 
 Note-Taking:  I also had to learn this art after high school.  Unfortunately, even in university there are professors who are easy to take notes from and professors who are nightmares (usually because they bounce around topics a lot).  After many years of perfecting my technique, I've discovered that the best way to deal with both AND get some "free" studying in is to take notes in class the best you can, then sit down somewhere quiet later and recopy the day's notes into a "final" notebook.  This is where the different colored pens come in really handy.  The act of organizing the information you were given, writing it again, and even thinking about/choosing appropriate colors for topics, etc. is actually a dynamite and fairly painless study tool.  Without feeling like you committed a bunch of time to just reading and re-reading your notes, you got a lot of exposure.
 
 Flash Cards Are Your Friends.  I don't care what the subject is.
 
 Just Re-Reading Your Notes is NOT Studying.  That's something we all did too much of in high school.  You'll spend less time studying and get more bang for your buck if you re-write your notes, make flash-cards, read your notes aloud to someone else, and have classmates give each other pop quizzes off notes.  I've also found it's useful to have someone who knows nothing about the subject try to decipher my notes and ask me questions.  Explaining to them what they SHOULD have asked really helps!  
 
 In general, college is stimulating, stressful, and important.  It can also be fun, adventurous, and mind-expanding.  At it's best, it's all these things.  Just remember the moderation!

[jecklar]

Being of the been to college/graduated/graduate school/taught description, I'd add:
 
 Be leery of "you can play all the Layo/WoW/Whatever you want and do fine" advice. Tailor that to your needs. Some classes/majors/students require more focus on schoolwork than others, and you can very definitely flunk out of college by spending too much time on these things. I've seen it happen -- and did it myself with PnP D&D about a million years ago. So you have been warned!
 
 Note-Taking: I also had to learn this art after high school. Unfortunately, even in university there are professors who are easy to take notes from and professors who are nightmares (usually because they bounce around topics a lot). After many years of perfecting my technique, I've discovered that the best way to deal with both AND get some "free" studying in is to take notes in class the best you can, then sit down somewhere quiet later and recopy the day's notes into a "final" notebook. This is where the different colored pens come in really handy. The act of organizing the information you were given, writing it again, and even thinking about/choosing appropriate colors for topics, etc. is actually a dynamite and fairly painless study tool. Without feeling like you committed a bunch of time to just reading and re-reading your notes, you got a lot of exposure.
 
 Flash Cards Are Your Friends. I don't care what the subject is.
 
 Just Re-Reading Your Notes is NOT Studying. That's something we all did too much of in high school. You'll spend less time studying and get more bang for your buck if you re-write your notes, make flash-cards, read your notes aloud to someone else, and have classmates give each other pop quizzes off notes. I've also found it's useful to have someone who knows nothing about the subject try to decipher my notes and ask me questions. Explaining to them what they SHOULD have asked really helps!
 
 In general, college is stimulating, stressful, and important. It can also be fun, adventurous, and mind-expanding. At it's best, it's all these things. Just remember the moderation!

[lonnarin]

here are my tips for higher learning...

1) Never let a career student/professor lecture you about "the real world" when you arrive to class 5 minutes late.  If they try this, laugh directly in their hostile little faces and point out that you have a 40-hour-per-week job, get paid better than they do, and pay their salary, not the other way around.  Point out that in "the real world" you could sue them for each and every class they decide to cancel since you paid for their time, not the other way around.  In the "real world", students go on to graduate and leave the college for job opportunities in actual companies, instead of just going to grad school, then getting a masters, then avoiding any "real world" application of their "skills" whatsoever to become a college instructor.  This is the "real world", and you will not be talked down to by a 30-something year old career student.  This world is yours, not theirs.

2) This is no longer highschool; jocks, preps and valley girls have no power here.  If some idiot jock decided to flick the back of your ears during class, stand up and dump your soda on his head.  If a preppie asks you for your seat, laugh in his face and say loudly for all in the class to hear... "Well, I guess you're not as popular as you thought you were in highschool... BRO!" point at him and keep laughing hysterically.  If a valley girl whispers insults about you behind your back, turn around and loudly proclaim, "Your daddy's counting down the days till graduation and he's cutting all of your credit cards.  Then what will you do for a living?  COMMUNICATIONS MAJOR?!  AHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!"  Or conversely, ignore all these people.  They are inconsequential in the great scheme of life, this... real world.

3) The Registrar's Office is NOT there to help you... go there understanding that it's sole purpose is to mess up your records every single semester and keep you from graduation for yet another semester.  If somebody behind the desk at this office claims to have fixed any of your problems in your transcript or your class registration, demand to see the changes in writing and signed by them affirming that they were the ones who made the changes.  If you do not, a few weeks later you will get a call from a random department saying that they have just dropped you from courses X Y Z because of clerical errors on your part.  Always keep the paper trail handy, or you will be blamed for every mistake you didn't make.

4) Your bf or gf in college is expendable.  There is NO reason whatsoever to get so depressed over a breakup that your grades need to suffer.  If you find yourself recently dumped, choke down all those feelings you have for them and just move on and immerse yourself in your studies.  Then when you pass the final, then you can cry...  Not a second before.  Besides, like I said, they're expendable.  You can find another college gf or bf any time you chug a couple of pints and barf on some strangers' shoes.

5) Deadlines are real.  Don't turn in stuff late, and don't make excuses for your resulting bad grades when you do turn stuff in late.  You only have yourself to blame for missing deadlines.

6) It's better to have a small group of real friends you can rely on than to have a whole lot of people who pretend to be your friends because you have the same greek-lettered tote bag as they do.  The latter of the two will just steal from you when your back is turned a look for a good place to stick a knife.

7) Get to know the janitors.  They can unlock the doors to your professor's office any time you need to turn in a late paper or plant evidence for the authorities should they ever cross you.

8 ) Never go to a kegger without clear access to a getaway route should cops show up unexpectedly.  2nd story apartment parties are ok, since you can survive a jump off the balcony and sprint out the back, but 3rd or 4th story parties are really pushing it unless you have some bedsheets handy to be used as a rope.

9) Experimentation is fine, but never when there is a camera present.  You might want to run for president one day.  Instead, whenever you're at wild parties it is much better to BE the guy with the camera.  That way you can blackmail any future senators or CEOs in the future... for a 120 dollar digital camera, this is a sound investment... AND you get to keep the camera.

10) College is the time of your life, up until the last few years when you realize that real life is a lot like college, just without all the annoying classes and career-students telling you what to do.  From that point on, college sucks as much as highschool and your young adulthood seems like the time of your life.  This too is an illusion.  Everybody knows that the time of our lives is when we retire with grandkids; old enough to fake dementia any time we are caught shoplifting.  "huh?  how did this mp3-player get in there?  I'm old!  Escort me to the bus stop!"

[LynnJuniper]

Hey! I'm technically a communications major..well..journalism...*cries*

[lonnarin]

Journalism is ok.  That's my minor .  At least we get to learn how to format our work for periodicals and how to badger people for a story.  The flat out art of communication though cannot be taught... it's like a charisma score; you either have it or you don't.  So many of my professors for those courses used to mumble incoherently in the wrong language that I lost faith in the field.

Speaking of which...

11) NEVER accept a class in which your instructor cannot efficiently speak the official language of the school's home nation.  There is NO EXCUSE for the college to hire somebody you can't understand from a different country... none whatsoever.  These people are here to TEACH, not learn English along the way via teaching.  I've had over 8 lecture classes with people who spoke English worse than a 5-year-old native... the amount of coursework lost in context and translation is simply unacceptable.

[Tialle Dianesis]

3) The Registrar's Office is NOT there to help you... go there understanding that it's sole purpose is to mess up your records every single semester and keep you from graduation for yet another semester.  If somebody behind the desk at this office claims to have fixed any of your problems in your transcript or your class registration, demand to see the changes in writing and signed by them affirming that they were the ones who made the changes.  If you do not, a few weeks later you will get a call from a random department saying that they have just dropped you from courses X Y Z because of clerical errors on your part.  Always keep the paper trail handy, or you will be blamed for every mistake you didn't make.

Too, true...  

About 3 hours of waiting in line and several visits I'm hoping the Register's Office at least has my address right this time. Somehow, it all feels to me like a sinister joke against college freshman.

[miltonyorkcastle]

it's not the registrars office that always gets me... it's the financial aid office that messes up my livelihood each semester.

[Honora]

Registrar was fine, financial aid always treated me well.  My gripe? "Advising".  When I went in to get a schedule for chemistry, the (male, non-native) "councilor" told me that "women don't do well in chemistry, you should take biology, it's easier".

Seriously.  Unless you get serious warm fuzzies from your advisor, ignore them.  

I passed, by the way.  Even though I'm a woman.

[Pseudonym]

*is tempted to make a smart reply to Jill's post but cannot think of how to do so and remain uncrucified, instead goes with;*

lonn, you crack me up! Funnier still because I honestly believe you have lived each and every one of your 11 college pointers.

[LynnJuniper]

Your advisor sounds like my mother. har.