1. Planners
I know some of you may be thinking "how in the world did you not know about planners?". I mean, I'm sure I knew what a planner was, but I had never used one.I had no idea that a planner is basically the only way 90% of college students keep their life together. I went through my entire first semester of college, planner-less. I was constantly doodling due dates and study session times down on scrap paper, you can guess how well that worked. I finally discovered the planner and my life and organization was changed, for the better, forever.
2. Plagiarism Checkers
Every college student's worst fear, plagiarism. Even if you know you came up with every word of that narrative essay all on your own, there is still that little voice in the back of your head making you think of every possible way you could get caught in a plagiarism debacle. And we have all had a little uncertainty when it comes to our citations being perfectly formatted. Little freshman me would have been saved from a lot of anxiety if I would have just run my paper through one of the many online plagiarism checkers that are available. They will tell you the percentage of your paper that is plagiarized and even highlight the areas that may need adjusting.
3. Google Scholar
While we are on the topic of writing papers and using citations, Google Scholar changed my entire outlook on writing research papers, or any paper for that matter. Google Scholar is a search engine that only pulls up scholarly articles for whatever you search. It also gives you the citation in multiple formats, so you don't have to enter the URL into easy bib or God forbid, write it out yourself. So no more having professors take off points for using unreliable sources, no more searching the library inventory for scholarly articles that are relevant to your topic and no more using risky citations you pieced together.
4. Online book stores
Everyone knows college text books are extremely over priced. But not everyone knows that there are multiple online store that let you rent your text books for a fraction of the price. I didn't discover Chegg until my sophomore year and it saved me so much money! I was also able to sell back some of the books I purchased and no longer needed. Plus, they send you little goodies with your order!
5. Elite Note takers
What is an elite not taker you may ask? I asked myself the same thing. Apparently, there is an online program called One Class that pays students to take notes in class and share them. If you have exceptional note taking skills, then why not get paid for it? I have personally never done this but, if its legit, it seems pretty awesome!
6. Pocket Points
Another way to get rewarded for going to class. Pocket Points uses your location to track when you are on your school's campus. It will start collecting points when you lock the screen. If you unlock it, it stops collecting points until it is locked again. You can then cash in your points for all kinds of deals, local and online. Local business will put coupons on the app and you can get all kinds of free stuff and discounts.
7. Free Food
Everyone who has ever been in college knows that free food can never be passed up. You however, may not know that there is an app called Hooked that posts all kinds of discounts and coupons for restaurants in your area daily. The best part is, certain restaurants will pick a time slot every so often and just give away free food. So if you check your app daily, you can always find out when to cash in on free food!
8. Free things on campus
Most students who are new don't realize how many things on campus are available for your use. I hate to call it free because you're definitely playing for it, but most colleges have workout classes that you can attend whenever you'd like, I wish I would have known about this sooner. Also there are buses that can take you anywhere on campus and even some places off campus, so if you live off campus check the bus route near you before buying an over price parking pass. Also you pay for a lot of things that no one tells you about, you can look It all up. One example is copies, your tuition included so many copies per semester so print out everything you want and get your moneys worth.
