5 Things to do Before You Go Away to College

5 Things to do Before You Go Away to College Heading to college this fall? TutorNerds is here to help. High school is finally over, graduation day has arrived, which means you have successfully survived high school. Congratulate yourself because you deserve it. You championed those nasty standardized exams, you passed your AP classes (TutorNerds offers AP test Tutoring), you survived cafeteria food for four years, you did three hours of homework a night all while maintaining a part time job and gaining volunteer experience. And now you are done, well sort of. There are still an additional four years ahead of you (and for some of you a lot more than that; PhD anyone?). Of course, these next years won’t be anything like the four years in high school. You will have freedom to actually choose what you want to study, you will set your own schedule and take your own responsibilities, and you will still have to eat cafeteria food (READ our post on Self-Discipline). Countless students leave a bit unprepared for college and that can make the first semester a giant wake up call to the responsibilities of university life. I’m not talking about pre-ordering a twin sheet set for your dorm or getting to know your roommate prior to your arrival, I’m talking about good old fashioned organization and academics. Here are 5 things you can do to make life a lot easier during that first semester in college: One: Have a tutor, keep a tutor. Need a tutor, find a tutor Remember the tutor (most likely the private Orange County tutor from TutorNerds) that helped you through SAT, ACT or AP? Chances are they tutor other subjects as well. With the use of handy dandy technology, many tutors give lessons via Skype. If you have already found your perfect match, why make a change? Tutors book up early so if you want to keep your favorite tutor, make sure to let them know and make sure that they offer remote tutoring, especially if you are moving to a different time zone. Didn’t need a tutor in high school or didn’t get one but kind of wish that you had? Arrange for a tutor now rather than later. You don’t want to be in a position where you are scrambling around looking for a brand new tutor just after failing your first midterm. Even if you feel pretty confident that your academics are strong, do yourself a favor and call a tutoring company to put your name on the list of potential students. It could be the difference between having a tutor within a week or within a month. Don’t waste time (and possibly your first semester GPA) searching for a tutor when things have already gone downhill. A final point, choosing a private tutor for the summer (READ: ten reasons you need a summer tutor) will help you gain confidence and courage for the big switch to college. How do we know? Our college educated tutors have all made the leap, so theyll give you an insiders perspective as you prepare. Two: Review your core subjects and pick your core classes Before you burn your essays in a celebratory bonfire, go through all of your senior year English and math assignments and look for patterns. Patterns include things that you are consistently good at as well as things that need improvement. If you rock at algebra but probability problems made you want to run away screaming, use this knowledge about yourself to pick your freshman classes. Sign up for Algebra 1A but skip Statistics 101. If you hated writing papers with a passion, find out if you can take English Composition 101 in your second semester. There is no way around taking this class at the college level but you might be able to put it off until you feel more comfortable about college life. Three: Fill in the gaps Remember when your high school English teacher assigned summer reading (or in-class reading) and you took a shortcut by using Cliff notes or Spark notes and didn’t actually read the book? College is when these decisions seem like a bad idea in retrospect. Being well read will help you out in nearly every liberal arts college class that you take. Even engineering and computer science majors will find themselves on the humanities side of the campus during those first two years. Take the time to read the books that you truly skipped and review ones that you may have skimmed while in a hurry. Your older self will thank you later. (READ: the 10 best teen reads) Four: Have a game plan When I was in college I took a nice long look through the list of required classes and discovered that I could easily kill two birds with one stone, so to speak, by taking say Literature 2, instead of Literature 3. That left me with a ton of leftover units that I used to take fun electives or ‘easy A’ type courses. There is no reason why you can’t do the same. Don’t waste your time taking 2 classes that you don’t really like when you could have filled a few hours of your week doing something you love. Five: Dont bite off more than you can chew So, you took two AP classes, scored a 1900 on the SAT and maintained a 3.8 GPA during your senior year. That helped you get the well deserved acceptance letter to the place you will be moving to this fall but, so did everyone else that will arrive on campus in September. This doesn’t mean that you’re not awesome; it just means that everybody else is also awesome. The competition is fierce. If your counselor at UC or Cal State tells you that the maximum number of classes you should take is 4, don’t be brave and sign yourself up for 5! The academic counselors have mentored thousands of students and they know what works and what doesn’t. If you are behind on classes, save it for summer or at least save it for your second year. First semester freshman year is not the time to overload yourself. University life can be incredibly wonderful if you are able to balance out your academic and social lives. Do yourself a favor and ease in to your first few months at college. Remember all of the useful things that you learned in high school and learn how to cut through some of the red tape. Enjoy a seriously fun summer and head off to the next stage of life in a couple of months. All blog entries are written by Tutor Nerds. Are you an education professional? If so, email us at info@tutornerds.com for guest blogging and collaborations. We want to make this the best free education resource in SoCal, so feel free to suggest what you would like to see us post about. Orange County parents and students, listen up! Beat the summer slowdown with a private, in-home tutor. We work around your schedule so you can stay sharp while having fun in the sun. Read: 10 Reasons You Need a Summer Tutor. What are you waiting for? Call us. Teach.com