Cultus
College life comes with many academic responsibilities and even more social opportunities, which is why most students find themselves constantly working on something. Plus, with all the exams you need to study for, lectures you have to attend, jobs you might have, and social opportunities that you will often pass on due to all the previously mentioned things that you can’t ignore, you might start stressing out and feeling like you can’t hold yourself together. This is why it’s essential for every busy student to learn how to become and stay organized, and if you consider yourself to be one of them, here are a couple of suggestions that might help you.
Buy a planner
…and carry it with you at all times. School planners don’t cost much, so get one that can fit into your pocket or that won’t take too much space in your bag. Write down every important date and assignment, and check your planner every day so there is no way for you to forget about an important exam or project. Sure, you could do this on your phone as well, but writing things down by hand is still a lot faster, which can be a lifesaver if you need to write down something quickly or if you need to write down a lot of information in a short amount of time.
Study wisely and on time
When it comes to studying, most students like to procrastinate until the last moment when the panic hits them. Needless to say, this isn’t the right way to approach your exams, and it’s definitely not the organized way. Therefore, once you know when your exams are and how difficult they might be, change your bad habits and give yourself enough time to study. Moreover, make sure to study the hardest things first, because you will feel much more confident in your abilities once you master the most difficult part. Plus, giving yourself enough time also means that if you do run into something that isn’t clear to you, or if you notice that you miss some notes from a certain lecture, you will have enough time to revise what you don’t understand with your professor or friends ‒ which is not something you can do if you study a day before the exam.
Label everything
If you like to print your notes and generally write a lot on paper, make sure to file them and label them so you can always know where everything is. This is where quality and durable Dymo labels come into play. By labelling your files with quality labels that won’t fall off after a day, you will be able to find everything you need much more easily ‒ and you never know when you’ll need to go back to that one subject you had two years ago and dig through your old notes. Or, you might want to help a freshman with their notes one day, and you won’t really be able to do that if you can’t find what you need in a pile of files and notes that all look the same.
Keep your room organized
You can’t keep your mind organized if you’re constantly distracted by the mess in your room. So, one of the first things you should do is clean your room and declutter ‒ get rid of everything you don’t need and more importantly, stop buying things you don’t need. Also, share things with your roommate ‒ if they are bringing a coffee maker, you bring a microwave; if they are bringing a table lamp, you bring a trash bin. There’s no need for duplicates if you can share, and you’d only be creating unnecessary clutter. Plus, this way, you’d both be saving money by not having to buy the things your roommate will bring.
Organize your laptop
Your room is not the only study environment you should organize ‒ clean up your laptop as well. Make separate folders for every year, every semester, and every class, and sort out all your pictures, songs, movies, whatever it is that you have on your laptop. Moreover, keep your desktop clean ‒ the only things that should be on it are shortcuts and assignments that you didn’t finish and need to check, find, or send to a friend the first thing in the morning. In other words, you digital environment should be just as organized as your physical one so you don’t have to waste time looking for the study material that you saved on your laptop weeks ago, but you can’t remember where.
The key to being productive in college without sacrificing your sleep or your social life is a good organization. If you learn how to manage your time, keep your room clean, organize your documents, label your files, and keep track of all your important dates, have no doubt that your college years will become one of the most exciting and fun periods of your life.
