Pushing through to The End

By Alex Bolten

Now that we’re all well rested and back from Spring Break, it’s time to get back into the swing of things and stay focused until the end of the semester. There’s a little over one month left, and it’s important to stay strong and push through everything. You’ll be having projects and group assignments popping up, but you need to make sure you’re also taking advantage of every opportunity that you have left this semester. Here are a few tips and tricks to help you make the most of your last month:

1.     Mark your calendar!

a.     I say this quite often, but it’s something that is absolutely necessary. You’re probably about to get swamped with projects, exams, and meetings. It’s very important that you stay on top of everything so that you don’t forget about a due date and end up doing a project a few hours before it’s due.

2.     Make time for career-related events.

a.     “Career Week,” the weeklong event hosted by Career Development, is coming up in the middle of April (April 11-15). This event brings in speakers from campus and different companies to present on various topics to help advance your career. There are multiple workshops each day, all culminating in a “Reverse Career Fair,” which will be held on Friday afternoon.

3.     Attend the Reverse Career Fair

a.     This may be one extra thing to add to your list, but I can’t tell you how invaluable the experience will be. The fair will put you in the place of an employer, where you have to sell yourself to a company. There’s going to be a callout for this event on Wednesday, March 30 at 6 pm in BRNG 1284 that will give you more information. You don’t want to miss it!

4.     Be proactive

a.     I’ve already given you two different things that you can attend that are still coming up in the semester, although there are others. Check the CCO’s website or ask your advisor if they know anything about what’s going to take place in April or possibly early May. I know there will be at least one more career fair, which will be very helpful if you’re still looking for a job after graduation or an internship for the summer!

Follow these tips and I’m sure that you’ll be able to excel. It may seem daunting to add some new events to your calendar, but you’ll be glad you did once you attend and they better prepare you for life after graduation. Think of these events as “helpers” and not “hindrances,” because all that they can do is help you.

The Importance of Staying on Track

By Alex Bolten

We’re all pretty busy with our weekly schedules, classes, and social lives. It’s really easy to fall behind on something or to lose track.

Personally, I’ve fallen a little behind with my homework. I keep trying to get caught up, but it seems as if things keep getting added to my to-do list. It’s not fun having to spend my weekend doing a reading that should’ve been done a week ago, or postponing my job search so that I can get an assignment finished. I’m hoping to use Spring Break as my “catch-up and get ahead” week, where I plan to get completely caught up with my work and then get ahead in a few of my classes by about a week or so.

Below I offer some tips to try and help you to stay on track, so that way you don’t end up like me.

1.     Make a daily to-do list

a.     I keep a mortar board/agenda book in my backpack when I go to campus. I have written in there every assignment that I’ll have due for the semester. This way, I know exactly what’s due when during any given week and I won’t have to dig through my syllabi.

2.     Take time for yourself.

a.     It can be very easy to get overwhelmed with your schoolwork, especially if you’re taking a lot of classes. Be sure to take a lot of little breaks while you study or do homework. It’s better to take 5-minute breaks about once every 25 minutes, as opposed to trying to sit there for 5 whole hours. You’ll find that your productivity will increase and that you’ll get done faster (but you have to stick to it!).

3.     Do the thing on your list

a.     You could either do that reading for tomorrow or go to a party. While the latter sounds more fun, the former is probably more important. It’s ok if you want to skip out on the reading to be with your friends, but just remember that you’ll have to do it eventually. And by this, I mean you’ll have to do it at a time when you’ve got other work to do or tests to study for. Bottom line: put off your assignments as seldom as possible.

It’s important that we do all of the things that we want to do, but we also have to do the things we have to do. I’m learning the hard way that “I’ll do it later” is actually not a good habit to get into. “Later” always comes, but it arrives with more things than I thought it would. Follow these tips so that you don’t end up like me, and so that you can stay on top of everything and get through the rest of the semester.

Job Searching Tips

By Alex Bolten

We’re at the point in the semester when the Purdue Memorial Union is full of companies at various career fairs and many other companies are in the process of doing on-campus recruiting. If you’re like me, you probably dread this time of year (both in the spring and the fall). In my opinion, there’s an enormous amount of pressure to network, talk to companies, and graduate with a job. While these things can seem scary, they don’t have to be if you start early enough. It’s like when you have a big project due for a class: doing small tasks over time will make the end result better than if you wait the night before to even begin. Here are some things that I’ve been doing to help my job search process.

1.     Begin early

a.     February may not seem “early,” but it’s better than beginning in April. I’d rather be spending a little time looking right now than scrambling to find something the week before I graduate.

2.     Branch out

a.     Maybe you want to find a job near your hometown. I would challenge you to not do this – why limit yourself? If you’re from Indianapolis, for example, you can stay in Indy, or you can go to Chicago, Cincinnati, and many other places. I’ve found that it’s helpful to look at the “big areas” near where I live (which is close to Cincinnati) and that this has drastically opened up the range of where I can look.

3.     Reach out to companies

a.     A lot of companies may not post career information on their websites, but they most likely have a “contact us” page with an email address that starts with the word “info.” Email this address and inquire about job openings, stating who you are, what you’re studying, and when you’ll graduate. You’ll never know until you ask!

4.     Use your network

a.     You’re always told to network, but do you ever use the people in your network? If not, you most definitely should! You never know who will be working at a company you’re looking at. “It’s not what you know, but who you know.”

If you’re dreading the process of job searching (and trust me, you’re not the only one), just follow these tips to help you get started. You also don’t have to spend hours upon hours on this each day. Break things up into 30-minute intervals. For 30 minutes on Monday, look here, on Tuesday, look into this industry, etc. The more you research and dig, the more things you’ll find and the closer you’ll get to starting your post-graduation career path.

Getting Back on Track

By Alex Bolten

Hopefully you had a nice and relaxing break! While it was nice to have this time off, it’s now time to get back into the swing of things, because we are in the second week of the semester already. It’s important to make sure that you don’t get behind and stay on top of things from the start, as this semester is a week shorter than the fall.

Here are three strategies that I have used throughout my college career to keep myself on track. See what works for you, and adapt these methods to best fit your learning needs.

1.     Lists

a.     I usually take a look at my syllabi and see what’s going to be due later in the week in terms of homework. On Sundays, I write down what will need to be done and determine the day(s) on which the particular task can be accomplished. By Friday, my lists are usually all crossed off, and I don’t have to use any of my free time on the weekends playing catch-up.

2.      Use your calendar

a.     I have 3 calendars: a big one on my wall, my mortar board/agenda calendar in my backpack, and my phone’s calendar. I mark important dates of assignments, projects, and exams. I may not always get to work ahead on these things, but I’m always aware of when they’re due.

3.     Limit distractions

a.     I tend to get distracted really easily (we all do!). My problem is checking “Facebook,” or “Buzzfeed,” or “Yahoo!” when I do not really want to work on my assignments. To help get rid of this problem, I downloaded a website blocking app to my MacBook’s desktop called “SelfControl.” I can set a specific time for sites to be blocked, as well as the names of the webpages that I know will be distracting (for example, I always block “Facebook,” but not my email, as I may need that whilst I work). Each operating system uses a different app to block sites, and you can Google which one would work on your laptop. I’ve found this method to be highly effective and it has certainly increased my productivity, because I can’t go to the site that would otherwise waste hours of my time

Try these strategies to get you back on track for the semester. I know I’ve had to really push myself to implement them, but they have started to work. Again, see what does and doesn’t work for you. You know yourself more than anyone else, and you know what’s going to aid in your learning and productivity.

Coursework as Employer Work

By Alex Bolten

There are only two weeks left in the semester! Last week was Thanksgiving break, and after dead week we’ll be heading home to celebrate the holidays with our friends and family. Two weeks doesn’t seem like a lot of time, and it really isn’t. You’ve got finals, papers, group projects, and more between now and when you get to go home for break. While this can seem daunting and you may not want to do the things you have to, it’s important to remember that you’re almost done.

It’s crunch time for everyone, and you need to make sure that you’re putting forth your best effort. Now is when most classes have their “big” assignments due and you don’t want to slack and get a bad grade just because you’re really want to go home.

You may think it’s ok to slack a bit, but it isn’t. When you have a career after graduation, you won’t be able to slack just because it’s the holidays (you’d probably lose your job).

My advice to you is to treat your schoolwork like you’re doing work for an employer. In the work environment, you’ll want to provide your employer with your best work possible so that you not only keep your job, you also move up within the company. If you give incomplete or “slack” work, you’ll get nowhere in the corporate world.

If you get into the habit now of treating your coursework like it’s a project for the company you’re working for, you can avoid being lazy and doing subpar work. Not to mention, this can help improve your grades. The better you do in the classroom, the more prepared and ready you’ll be for work after graduation.

This is a good habit to get into, and the sooner you can do it, the better. I know it’s hard to do it at this time of year, what with everything due and all. However, the earlier you can set up good habits, the harder it will be to break them once you’re in the corporate world. The more prepared, too, you'll be to tackle whatever the company throws at you. You'll be ready to get the job done if you're used to getting the job done, instead of taking the lazy way out and underperforming (and possibly getting fired).