Our summer interns put together a list of tips to stay organized in the upcoming school year!
1. Be Motivated
Keep yourself focused on your tasks with foreseeable goals and willingness to complete them. If you don’t, you won’t produce good work, if any work at all.
2. Keep a Planner
Keeping a planner allows your day-to-day activities to exist in a place outside of your head for reference when life gets stressful. Having a planner keeps life organized and reduces the stress on yourself to remember everything you have to do and everywhere you have to be.
3. Save All Syllabi
Having a class’s syllabus on-hand will allow you to stay on top of what is happening each day you walk into class and when you can expect to have big assignments, allowing you to plan accordingly.
4. Wake Up at the Same Time Everyday
Having a consistent sleep schedule allows your body to regulate itself, giving you to take on the day with a good amount of energy that is necessary to go to class and have fun.
5. Have a System for Taking Notes
Having a system for taking notes will allow you to not only take notes more efficiently (since you’ll have a single way you like to take them), but also read them later when you need to study and understand just what happened in class that day.
6. Work and Play in Different Areas
Letting the areas where you do school work and have a social life overlap can be problematic. Make sure that when you are working that you are 100% committed to working, while when you are having fun you are 100% committed to that too.
7. Give Each Class a Color
Keep all folders, binders, and notebooks color-coordinated will allow you to find notes, worksheets, and assignments easily and not intermixed between classes like that all encompassing “Homework Folder” can so often do.
8. 8/8/8 Method
Spend 8 hours working, 8 hours playing, and 8 hours sleeping each day. If you upset this balance, you’ll either be slacking on your grades, not enjoying life enough, or not be awake enough to do much of anything at all.
9. Sleep Enough
If you do not get enough sleep to get through the day without taking a nap, none of the first 8 things I just said will matter. Make sure you can make the most of your time by sleeping at least 8 hours per night.
10. Go Easy on Yourself
If you screw up somewhere along the way, don’t get down on yourself. We all make mistakes, and you need to cut yourself some slack when something doesn’t pan out the way you want it to. Life goes on, and everything will work out the way it is supposed to at the end of the day.
Good luck in the upcoming school year!