College Bound 2: Top 10 Strategies for Succeeding in College

Are your kids ready for college? Studies say only 32 percent of high school seniors graduate with the skills they need for college. About 60 percent of freshman in the California State University system need remedial help in math or English. Your kids who are heading to Christian colleges will appreciate the insights in Michael Bozack’s book Street Smart Advice to Christian College Students: From a Professor’s Point of View:

1. Study Your Study Habits
Few students, Christian or otherwise, come to college with good study habits. They either come from high schools where high grades could be achieved without studying much or they were never taught how to study without memorizing everything. Effective study habits in college, however, require practice, work and discipline. The earlier in your freshman year you get yourself alone in a library to study, the better you will do in college.

2. Clock into College
Say you are flipping burgers at McDonalds to help pay for college. What would be required of you? At minimum, your boss would expect you to show up on time, do your job completely and be professional and accountable. So, why would you do less as a student when there is much more at stake than cooking burgers? Why would you be on time for a job but cut your classes, or be competent at work, then turn in sloppy, careless homework in college? You wouldn’t! Treat being a student with the same loyalty and respect as you would treat a job. You will make fewer mistakes and feel better about your college experience.

3. Learn the Curve
You will save an enormous (that is a lot) amount of time and energy by understanding the grading systems used by college professors. Most employ either an absolute or a relative system commonly called a curved grading scheme. Students seem to understand an absolute system because they were used by teachers in high school, but most of my students taking introductory physics have little idea how a curved system works. If you don’t understand how you’re graded, you’ll find yourself putting your efforts where they are minimally effective. Don’t shoot yourself in the foot by misplaced effort! Get ahead of the curve and ask your professor to explain the grading system. Effort is costly and should be placed where it matters the most.

4. Save Dough-Ask the Pro(fessor that is)
When the going gets tough, it’s amazing how many students turn to everyone and everything except their college professors. Sometimes it’s because they have had a bad experience with a professor, their professor is not adept at helping students, or they simply don’t want their professor to know they’re so far behind the pace. Whatever the hangup, you’ve got to move on. I always encourage my students to ask for help early in the semester. I mean really, why hire a tutor or get a roommate to help when you have an expert in the field who you’ve already paid for! It’s true without exception that when a student gets in early for help, the one-on-one interaction turns an F on the first test into an A or B before the course ends.

5. Avoid Rookie Mistakes
Success in life depends on minimizing mistakes. Just as turnovers play a large role in the outcome of a football game (turn the ball over and you lose–hang onto the ball and you win), the same is true for college students. The best college students make the fewest mistakes. They don’t cut classes or fail to hand in homework; they don’t put social life and work ahead of school; they don’t quit classes when they get hard or expect professors to spoon feed them; and they don’t prefer shortcuts to honest effort. They certainly don’t wait until the last minute to study and then pray for God to rescue them; they actually study and do the work! If you can avoid these common rookie mistakes, you will gain some serious yards and take your GPA to the goal line!

6. Tick Tock-Time Block
You have enough time in college to do all the things you need to do, but only if you manage yourself wisely. Decide which four or five things are the most important and stick with them. One tip is to organize your courses, for example, in the morning. Yes, you might find yourself brain dead after four straight hours of lectures, but you will appreciate the uninterrupted time in the afternoon to study or schedule labs. An hour here or an hour there between classes most likely will lead to a cup of coffee at Starbucks, surfing the Web in a campus computer lab, text messaging your friends or watching TV in the student union. Time blocking will help you use your time wisely and free up more for you to be involved in other activities.

7. Mediocrity Is Lukewarm
Revelation 3:15 says, “I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other!” You are not called to be lukewarm! I often hear students saying, “I got A’s in high school without studying, so why should I study here?” Say what? This is not high school; this is college! A college education is determinative of the rest of your life; the stakes are much higher here. What worked for you in high school is not going to work in college unless you are majoring in basket weaving. The mediocrity of high school doesn’t fly in college if you want to be a person of excellence. Don’t spend too much time on the politics of getting through–instead enjoy the ride and do a good job at it.

8. Avoid the Social Snares
Christian students in a secular university inevitably are confronted by difficult social issues. College life is an environment full of new freedoms to experiment with risky behaviors formerly policed by parents and teachers. Sex, drugs, alcohol and the culture are the four most dangerous risks that can derail a successful college career. Relationship issues involving boyfriends/girlfriends can suck an enormous (once again this means a lot) amount of time away from achieving your ultimate college goals. Guard your life and focus on getting your degree. This can be accomplished by holding fast to biblical convictions and allowing God to guide your life. Poor judgments and social snares can short-circuit the wonderful life God has planned for you.

9. Get on the GPA Fast Track
One of the impediments to high performance in college is surviving the freshman year. A bad start makes everything difficult, meaning of course a good start makes everything easier. A high GPA earned during your freshman and sophomore years is difficult to knock down during your junior and senior years. Correspondingly, starting as a freshman in a GPA hole makes it difficult, if not impossible, to build it back to acceptability during the remainder of your college years. Opt for deferred rewards and work hard early on–then you can cruise later.

10. Remember Who Got You into College in the First Place
The biggest mistake you as a Christian student could make is neglecting God in college. It makes zero sense to leave God out of your university life when He is the primary reason you are there! So much is riding on your college years that you need God now more than ever! You need daily wisdom, guidance and strength that no professor can offer. You need help studying for tests, doing assignments, finding good friends, finding a job, finding a church and to guide you through a host of other college-related experiences. Most of all, you need God to protect you from cultural forces that seek to derail your life.

Michael Bozack

YouthWorker

YouthWorker

College Bound 2: Top 10 Strategies for Succeeding in College

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