Isn't It Time You Hit the Books?
If high school made it look easy, college can be a shock. We asked students what works—and what to avoid
It was freshman year, and Angie Trevino thought she'd ace her microeconomics class at the University of Oklahoma. An older student had told her she could skip the lectures—the required discussion sessions would cover all the course material. So Trevino gladly slept in on lecture days and faithfully attended the discussions. "I was doing fairly well—I got high grades on tests and quizzes. I went in and took the final and thought I did great," she says. When she ended up with a B, she was shocked. "It was because my professor didn't see my face in the lecture," she says. "It was a rude awakening."
Now a graduating senior, Trevino, 22, realizes she got bum advice. "In high school, I was so monitored to go to class, it was hard to miss," she says. "In college, you are responsible for your own actions and can't blame problems on someone else. It doesn't work like that."
Disappointing grades are just one hint that the approach many students took during high school won't work in college. The answer for new students is to step up their academic game. So, in addition to a "things to do" list, here are a few "things to be" that can help your transition to college.
Be there. All that newfound freedom in college applies not only to Saturday nights but to Monday mornings, too. "We are not calling you and getting you out of bed, and we are not tucking you in," says Michael Miyamoto, assistant dean of students at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. Those extra hours under the covers won't conjure up warm feelings if you've missed critical information in class: "You will get an experience in the classroom that you will not get from a book," says Gavin Sands, 22, a graduating senior at Elon University in North Carolina. In an upper-level contemporary art class, for instance, Sands was at sea; she found the assigned readings "confusing and intense." Loaded with questions, she would go to class and be glad to hear there were no "right" answers. "I would think there was something in the reading I was missing, but when I got to class, I realized that it was about a whole lot of opinions," she says.
Skipping class may seem tempting, especially those intro classes that can top out at several hundred students. The profs are unlikely to take attendance or even learn most students' names. But Trevino says class is great for meeting people, feeling connected to campus, and getting those crucial snippets of advice that profs mete out to help with exams. It can seem a breeze to blow off homework, too, if it won't count toward your final grade. Some professors do not check the assignments, but remember: Those assignments are often good indicators of what the professor will most likely put on the exams.
Be willing to talk to teachers. Stress, confusion, and a low grade here or there are all part of freshman year. Talking to a professor or resident adviser can keep those problems from spiraling. But piping up takes moxie. "If you are shy, it might be intimidating, but you have to put yourself out there," says Heath Thompson, 19, a sophomore at the University of Oklahoma. Sands thought "professors were going to be crazy, ridiculous, intense academic scholars, and I would be racing to keep up with them. But when I got here, I was amazed that they were real people and approachable."
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