local road trips put your best foot forward an organized college life

orGAnizE your College Life
14
The tools every student needs to succeed
Saddleback College Magazine
By Melanie Roberts
Panic strikes as you walk into class and realize
you never completed your midterm paper that
is due today. Suddenly, you regret the extra
hours you covered at work, the time you spent
hanging out with friends, and the movie you
saw the night before. If only you had set aside time to write
your paper.
As young adults enter college and take on a new workload,
many struggle to stay organized and juggle the various aspects
of their newfound responsibilities. Countless students
fail to organize their numerous tasks and
begin to fall behind in classes. However,
there are effective ways
to stay on top of consuming
workloads.
The change from
high school to college
can be significant.
For several
students, this
new academic
setting means
finding a balance
between
school, work,
sports and a
social life.
Kelli Howard,
an honors
student and
communications/
anthropology major,
says she often has a
lot on her plate.
“Life as a college student
will be one of the most stressful
things any of us do. Like every other
college student, I have had my share of all
nighters with junk food and unhealthy levels of red bull
and caffeine,” she says. “However, I do my best to keep track
of the bigger assignments and larger tasks and begin working
on them during small amounts of free time.”
Howard says she faces many of the same challenges her
peers do, even more so being part of the honors program.
Planner
An efficient way to organize events and study schedules is
with a personal planner or daybook. This way you can see if
certain events conflict and better manage your time. You can
also mark down when tests and quizzes are, and schedule in
advance when to study.
Angel Key, a college track and swim athlete, and communications
major, finds her planner to be a must have item. “I
stay pretty organized, but I really love having a planner,” she
says. “When I have a planner, everything through
my day gets a lot easier instead of running
around not knowing what I’m doing.
As an athlete, it is super important
to make your priorities
before you go out and
party.”
After 30 years
working with cost
management, Judy
Flores started her
own professional
organizing company.
Six years
later she says,
“time blocking”
is one of the
most powerful
keys to staying
organized.
“Time blocking
is critical for individuals
to be able to
see where all the time
is disappearing to. Start by
making a list of everything that
needs to get done in a week,” she
says. “Prioritize that list, then take a form
that you can create and time block your days.”
Paying Attention in Class
Taking effective notes in class is critical to college success.
When you take notes, it helps you to better understand the
material later when you are reading it.
For Child Psychology major Shahrzad Shahravesh, making