Know Your Deadlines

Written by Alex Bolten

At the start of your semester, most, if not all, of your professors will give you a syllabus, and these syllabi are most likely going to have the deadlines for all of your homework assignments. At first, this may seem overwhelming, but then you realize that some of your major assignments aren’t due until later on in the semester. “I’ve got time to kill,” you think. You’ve also just made a huge mistake.

What’s nice about having all of your assignments laid out for you is that you can see when everything is due in each of your classes. They may not be due until a month or so later, but if you don’t plan ahead, you’re going to fall behind.

It’s still the beginning of the semester. After about 2 weeks of class, maybe you’ve joined one or two student organizations, a sports team, or have gotten involved somehow in the community. While all of these things are great things to be involved in and great resume builders, they will quickly eat up your free time. You’ll not only have these things to worry about, but also your classes, time with friends, and homework time.

With all of these other distractors, it’s easy to wait until the last minute and let your homework pile up. You may know about it weeks in advance, but you could find yourself not doing it until the day before it’s due. While this may not be a problem for one class, you may have assignments for other classes that are due around the same time, while simultaneously you have club meetings and friends who want to hang out with you.

This is why you need to make sure you budget your time effectively. There’s no problem with getting things done early, and that’s much better than being stressed to the max when you have a bunch of assignments to work on at once, all due within the span of a few days.

Tips on how to stay ahead:

1.     Read your syllabi thoroughly so that you can get a feel for what type of assignments you’ll be doing and when they’ll be due.

2.     Mark your calendar with important due dates and exam dates. Make sure this is in a place that you’ll be able to see everyday.

3.     Use color-coding for easier recognition – on your calendar, write in different inks for different classes or create different categories (exam, study guide, paper, etc.) and highlight each category a different color.

4.     Set yourself reminders on your phone. In this day and age, it’s really easy to remind yourself whenever something is due. Make sure you’re reminded far enough in advance so that you will have ample time to finish your assignment(s).

Follow these steps and you should be fine. It’s nice to have fun while you’re at college, but your academics need to come first. The best way to be successful is to have low stress, and these steps can help you with that.