I’m pretty sure every university student makes some kind of academic goal as the new year commences, whether it be to keep up with all your “suggested” (aka non-compulsory, aka you don’t have to do it) reading, or simply to actually attend at least some of your 10ams *shudders*. However, these normally only last about a week into term, at which point you start to turn off that alarm and get back to old habits. There is a way to turn this around! If you make achievable goals, or try to alter your mindset about your degree you can make a difference in 2015. Here are some tips on how.
Plan
Make a couple of academic goals for each week; write them down and put them somewhere you can see to ensure that you commit to them. Then, each day make a goal or two which will help you build up to completing your weekly one. Whether it’s simply to read some poems for an upcoming seminar, or do some research for a design report, it helps you keep on top of work.
Allocate time for ‘life admin’
We all know it’s pretty important to secure a summer internship, get a job post-graduation, or keep your CV up-to-date. Once you start losing track of keeping up with things like these, a time will soon come when academia has to be pushed to the wayside and hours upon hours will be spent making applications and getting your life in order. This is both insanely dull and unhelpful for your academic progress; making sure by the end of every fortnight everything’s up to date will help you to avoid this situation.
Attend your lectures and seminars
Although this seems like the simplest thing in the world, they’re easily put to the back of our schedule. From unruly hangovers to assignments that we probably should have done a few weeks back, there always seems to be something in the way. However, missing these really does start to create a vicious cycle of not knowing what is going on in your course, which then means when the next assignment comes up you’re simply incapable of doing it. Which will mean even more missed lectures and so on. As rough as it is, cutting back a little on extracurricular activities when you have an important piece of work due in is probably the way forward – why not motivate yourself to finish it with the thought of a big night out with your housemates, rather than skipping lectures?
These are just a couple of simple ways to help turn your degree around in 2015 – we all want to do better, but it’s hard to know where to start. Hopefully with these tips you’ll be able to start making 2015 your year!
Do you have any more tips on how to handle your degree in 2015? Let us know in the comments below!
Photo: mt 23 / Flickr
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