So, it’s that time of the semester: midterm season! It’s not as bad as finals season because midterms aren’t quite make-or-break the way finals are. But the semester isn’t over when midterms are over, so you need to find a way to keep on top of midterms AND everything else--a daunting challenge! Luckily, there are a few strategies, tested by me and my friends:
1. Study Incessantly
And he's probably not even done yet.
If you’re like my friends, this is what you’ll do. As soon as you get out of class, you’ll rush to the library, fretting about all you have to do to get ready. Then you’ll do it, taking 10-minute breaks for meals (and probably studying in the dining hall, too), until 1 or 2 a.m., at which point you’ll go back to your dorm. Or you’ll just fall asleep with your face in a book. But is that really worth it? At some point, you’ll want to...
2. Cruise
OK...maybe not like that.
This is the other extreme, where you just don’t worry about midterms, or at least you don’t worry about them more than any other assignment. You just do your regular homework hoping it will get you ready, or you just shut everything out and worry about yourself. If you’re worried sick, you’re going to fail, right? Well, if you don’t study, you’re also going to fail. That’s why you want to...
3. “Prioritize”
Every professor can be like this about their class, but you can't be this for every class.
Every professor thinks their class is the greatest thing since sliced bread. I’ve even had one tell me that we should be spending 12 hours a week, per class, studying outside of class. But who has 48 hours a week on top of classes, other commitments, and staying sane? So you have to figure out what’s actually important. If it’s not checked, and you don’t find it useful, don’t bother. Spend your studying hours doing problems of the kind that are actually on the midterm.
4. Pray
It's March; you may as well use a good luck charm to match.
No matter how many hours you can spend studying, there are bound to be curveballs on any exam. There could be problems with different parameters than those of the practice problems, or there could be super obscure questions you happened to overlook while you were studying. So you need to invoke your standard “good luck weapon”, whether that be a deity of choice, your friends or even the universe itself.
5. Procrastinate
"The prospect of being hanged in a fortnight greatly concentrates the mind." - My history teacher (on AP exam essays)
And there’s always the good old college standby: procrastination. Why do today what you can put off until tomorrow? It sounds stupid, and sometimes it is, because many times doing a good job requires a lot of time when you’re not tired and cranky (*ahem* 4 a.m. essay completion). And according to Hofstadter’s Law, “It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter’s Law.” But there is also Parkinson’s Law: “Work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion.” If you wait until the last minute, it should only take a minute to do.
How I wish midterms could be over in a minute! They won’t be, but once they are over, they’ll be o-v-e-r, and it’ll feel like just a minute passed. And you’ll be able to kick back, relax, and enjoy spring break.
