When September rolls around, back-to-school commercials and advertisements inundate your television screen and your timeline. It is easy to get ready for school when it is all everyone can talk about, but starting new classes in the middle of April is a bit different than starting in September. Classes begin right after you get back from spring break, so it can be difficult to transition from basking in the sun or catching up on Netflix to waking up early and hitting the books. To make your transition back to school as smooth as possible, there are a few important things to remember.
1. Make a calendar for yourself
By the end of the quarter, you know your class schedule like clockwork, so it can be hard to remember back to the first few days when you struggled to remember which class was in what building and at what time. To avoid showing up late or missing a class, make a calendar with the time and location of all your classes and keep it in your phone. Whether you made it yourself, or you’re using a screenshot of your schedule on Caesar, or you put your information into serif.nu, it is absolutely necessary to keep it with you at all times. Don’t be the kid who stumbles into your discussion section 10 minutes late and out of breath because you “swore this class was on north campus.”
2. Look at prices of books before you buy
Textbooks are expensive. At the beginning of the quarter, when your professors hand you the long lists of books you need to buy for the class, it can be very overwhelming. Rather than just trust that the bookstore has the best prices, check online to see if there are any cheaper versions available. Or, if you know someone who has taken the class, ask if they have the textbook that you can buy off of them for a cheaper price. You have a long quarter ahead of you, so do whatever you can to avoid spending all of your allowance right in the beginning.
3. Get yourself on a schedule
Humans, and particularly college students, are creatures of habit; take the first few days to start to see where and how you want to spend time outside of class. If you have time between classes, try spending your time at the library or the gym. If your classes are back to back, test out the fastest route to avoid being late. If your classes don’t start until later in the day, decide what would be the best use of your time in order to make your mornings as productive as possible. Things happen, so it is impossible to follow a schedule exactly, but it is important to make sure that you waste as little time as possible. Believe me, Netflix can wait.
4. Get “sylly”
There is a lot to do at the beginning of a new quarter and it can seem like a lot, but it is important to remember that this is generally the time of the year with the least amount of work; they call it syllabus week for a reason. Catch up with your friends, ask everyone how their spring breaks were, go to the gym, try out a new club and enjoy.
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