Sports Writer
It’s getting down to crunch time here at Baylor, and the libraries, computer labs and study corridors are becoming more populated by the second. Students are finally putting down their phones and are attempting to focus on course material that should have been mastered months ago.
The final stretch to final exams is here, and students better be prepared for it.
It seems that the fear of failure is finally hitting a majority of the student body, and studying is becoming a priority. Why isn’t studying a habit throughout the entire semester? I’ve got to admit that I’m not the best person sometimes when it comes to studying for quizzes and tests, but I still put in an adequate amount of time to get things accomplished.
Several students put things off and wait until the last minute to study for exams, and it doesn’t work out a lot of the time.
Stop wasting your time on other things. It’s college; there’s a lot of opportunity to have a good time and make memories, but the smartest people determine which times are for social hour and which times are allocated to school work.
Too many people make the wrong decision and blow off studying only to wake up the next morning regretting their decision. For example, I waited to start studying for my religion exam last month until 9 p.m. the night before. However, I studied for about 20 minutes before I dropped my notebooks to watch “American Horror Story” and then proceeded to Wendy’s afterwards to eat. I got back to campus and studied for an hour before going to bed and thought to myself, “I can study tomorrow morning before the test.”
I successfully bombed the test because of my unwillingness to sit down and study instead of giving in to all the distractions around me.
If you fail a test because you didn’t put enough time and effort into studying for it, then you probably deserve it. Students should not expect the professor to either curve their grade or be gracious to them when the test is being graded; this isn’t high school any more.
The professor will hand you the grade you deserve, and if that messes up your GPA, then tough luck. It’s not fair for you to be bailed out if you didn’t study.
A lot of students use the excuse that they didn’t have time to study or they had too much going on in the week, but there is an easy solution to this excuse. When registering for classes, students need to keep in mind the amount of course work that goes into each class before signing up for it.
If students don’t stack their semester with difficult classes with heavy course loads and instead mixes up their schedule and takes easier classes, then the amount of stress will be a lot easier to handle.
That decision isn’t always possible, I understand that, especially with students majoring in science or engineering. However, it’s not an excuse to throw around when you waste time not studying.
If a student doesn’t know how to properly study, they need to seek help immediately. If you didn’t study in high school, then studying in college is going to be almost impossible.
Students cannot put off studying and expect to get an A on a test with a 45-minute study session before class like they did in high school. I’ll admit that I was one of those smart kids in high school that didn’t need to study to get an A, but there’s no way that can carry over for me in college. Like other students, I am being challenged more than ever to earn good grades.
I am slowly learning how to be a successful student in college like everyone else, and through my trial and error situations with studying, I’m finding out my study habits and how much time I need to be successful on exams.
Don’t let your laziness, social life or inability to study affect your ability to get jobs in the future.
Let your GPA be the correct representation of the hard worker that you are. You’ll thank yourself later.
Cody Soto is a sophomore journalism major from Poth. He is a sports writer and regular columnist for the Lariat.
