Chapter 7. Essential Strategies for Success in College

Introduction

Some children grow up experiencing little to no failure and without realizing that not everyone is a winner. They therefore have little to no sense that you can (and should) learn from your mistakes because they have not experienced many. In these cases, everything has been done for them to ensure they always succeed and never fail at anything. They are known as “snowplow children” or members of the “trophy generation.” According to Wikipedia,¹ one of the first references to the participation trophy was on February 8, 1922, in The Evening Independent, an Ohio newspaper. The article mentions that trophies went to many participants, not only to the winners.

Many debate the pros and cons of the practice of giving every player a trophy at the end of the season. A pro is that no child feels left out; a con is that the trophy could be meaningless since every child received one. More importantly, when a child always wins, they do not get the chance to figure out what they are truly good at doing.²

It is hard to know where the line is for these situations. It is hard, even painful, to watch three out of 12 five-year-old children get a prize while the others get nothing, especially when your child is in that population of nine. Does a reward help very young children, say under seven or eight, become motivated? If so, then where is the line between more harm than good? Most importantly, at least for this context, how does it play out into adulthood, when young adults begin to fail at small and large things? This concern is especially dismaying when young adults have no idea at all what they are good at doing because they have been told they are good at everything. An A- is a “disaster,” not getting into a club “ruins their life,” and/or not becoming president of a club translates to, “I will never amount to anything or get a job.”

Children are smart enough to know who is good, better, and best—just ask them. They are smart enough to know that yes, while they were on the team that won, they mostly warmed the bench. As Gwenna Laithland wrote in 2019:³

“Would you like to know the secret my trophy generation has kept quiet all these years?

We knew.

We all knew. The ruse of awards for merely showing up was pretty transparent. Participation trophies weren’t some grand, global hoax that we all fell for. You can stop twisting your mustaches now.”

Laithland goes on to say that some children likely celebrated and felt part of something, maybe part of something for the first time, but most could tell the difference between winning and losing even at a young age. I think there is a fine line here between children feeling included and valued and handing out awards to everyone.

We learn from our failures and losses. Despite the pain at the moment, we learn when we struggle and then we work to move forward. We can determine where our strengths and weaknesses are and how to improve on those weaknesses, if we choose to do so. We learn to fight back when someone tells us we are not good at something; we know that we can be better, and we want to persist and improve. Or, we learn to walk away having learned from the experience. While grit is essential, at some point, we may need to realize that something we are trying repeatedly is not in our skill set. Failure hurts and stings for the child experiencing it and for the parent watching. However, it creates resilience and strength in a young person; it helps us learn what we are good at and what we enjoy when we are young.

I have a still clear memory of being somewhere between five and seven years old when my parents arranged for me to take piano lessons. I have no idea why. Neither of my parents played an instrument and I do not recall asking for the lessons. If I had, I doubt they would have complied. They bought a piano and sent me off to a friend of a friend’s house a few blocks away. I did not like the lessons or practicing, and I was not very good (I am pretty sure I am as close to tone deaf as one can be; though I can hear the difference in notes, I can’t replicate them). Nevertheless, I practiced as best as I could and I dutifully went to my lessons. I had my first recital and I was terrified because I knew I was not very good. I clearly remember my mother picking me up one day and the teacher saying something like, “I think you’re wasting your money; she doesn’t have a good ear and she’s not very good at playing.” Clearly, as I still remember it decades later, it stung, but it also confirmed what I knew, and it gave me an out. No one gave me a trophy, no one ever said, “you’re so good at piano.” It did, I think, teach me to focus on something else I loved and was pretty good at doing (swimming), and I think those two things often go together.

Search the internet for inspirational quotes on life’s challenges and struggles and you will find an endless supply of them.⁴ It seems, however, that this advice often goes unfollowed. What follows below is some of my best advice based on my years of working in higher education, my personal experiences, and information and advice learned from colleagues and at conferences. While much of this book has been geared toward parents or guardians, this chapter is aimed at students. So, if you are about to head off to college, I hope some (or all) of this advice will work for you. And if you are a parent or guardian, please read, share, discuss, and then… back off.

Embracing Independence

It is time. It is time to grow up a bit and be your own person. You need to own your college experience. You need to make new friends (and keep the old), discover new ideas and passions, and find what you want to study academically. If you are being pushed to go to medical school or law school, for example, and you do not want to follow that path, you need to find your voice and speak up. If you do not know how, you may want to consult with a counselor on how to begin the discussion.

Finding and following your own path does not mean that you do not love and respect your family. Taking control of your college experience means taking the classes that you want to take and declaring the major that you want to study. It also means finding “your people” in the new college environment. Those new friends may come from an orientation session, an introductory class, a club, or from a major requirement course. New students (whether entering from high school or as transfer students) may have to work a little harder, but I believe forging new connections can happen for everyone who tries.

For some students, they may find that their “dream school” is not the fit they thought it would be. Some students start off close to home and realize they want to be further away; some students go far away and realize they want to be closer to home. Some think they want to study a certain topic and then get to their new school to realize it is not offered, or not offered in the way they want. I have met many students who want to study something at my school, which is not offered. Do your research for the schools that you apply to!⁵

Follow Your Instincts (If They Are Good)

Trusting my instincts has generally worked well for me, but I hesitate to recommend it as universal advice, particularly for anyone under 25, as their brain is still developing. I believe that gaining life experience—through wins and losses, successes and disappointments—is essential for learning to trust your instincts and make confident decisions as you navigate life. When instincts are well-developed, they should (in most cases) provide reliable guidance. But how does someone develop strong instincts if most of their decisions have been made for them? How does one reach that point? And what exactly are instincts? Are they innate to humans, or are they entirely shaped by experience and learning?

If you search for a definition, you will get entries like “a natural or inherent aptitude, impulse, or capacity.”⁶ While I believe we may have some instincts, like a baby’s instinct to grip things, I am talking here about instincts in social situations. Humans are an advanced species and, as an anthropologist, I believe that our knowledge is learned, not inherited. If that is the case, do we and can we have instincts about how to make decisions? Read up on the topic and you will find a range of information, much of which I do not agree with.

Because I was trained as an anthropologist, I know and value the power of culture. We are the products of the environment we grow up in; we are not hard coded for much. I know biologists, psychobiologists, and others disagree, but my discipline has shown me multiple times how we reflect the culture in which we were raised. What we know and how we act is learned. Take a child at the moment of birth born in Philadelphia and immediately transport her to Shanghai. This child will grow up speaking fluent Chinese and have a very different set of values, cultural norms, and beliefs than she would have had she remained in Philadelphia. The same is true if you reverse that scenario. This situation is essentially the nature vs. nurture debate and there are strong opinions on both sides.

I believe our instincts are based on situations we experience and learn from over the course of our lives. The older you are, the more experiences you have and thus, perhaps, the better your instincts. Sometimes they are that first feeling you have about something and sometimes they come after thinking and talking and thinking again. Either way, those decisions are based on your accumulated, not biologically inherited, knowledge. If you have acquired knowledge from positive examples in your family or community, and learned from your own mistakes, then you are likely safe trusting your gut to make the right decision. And if not, you will learn from those subsequent mistakes.

If you have never had to make decisions or judge situations because it was always done for you, you will not have the instincts you want and need in life. It is not too late to start making your own decisions.

Have a Plan, but Be Willing to Ditch It

Going through college with no plan is not advisable, but going through college (and life) with blinders on that limit you to a single plan can be even more problematic. I often call this approach, “you can’t see the trees for the forest.” Many students enter UVA as “pre-something.” They are pre-law, pre-med, pre-business, or some combination of all of these. In other words, they are so focused on what is down the road after college, on the plan they made when they were 8, 10, or 15 years old, or on the plan that was defined for them, that they cannot see what is right in front of them. The forest is this future dream that they cannot articulate; and those trees are everything right in front of them—the wonderful classes, the faculty, the opportunities, etc. and they miss them.

A colleague told me she often plays the “why game” with her students when they seem to be set on a path that no longer interests them. If you have raised or been around a toddler, you know they ask an endless array of questions and many of them start with “Why… ?” She uses this approach with her students. For example:

Student: I want to go to medical school.

Instructor: Why?

Student: I want to help people.

Instructor: Why?

Student: It’s a good thing to do and I want to help people.

Instructor: Why do you want to help people by being a doctor?

Student: [no answer]

While some students can answer questions like these, some cannot. They have not thought through the road they are on, perhaps because it is not their road. In this specific example, many students who self-identify as “pre-med” have not thought about the many ways they can help people through other professions or even why they want to help people. Students with a set plan believe that leaving the path they chose at a young age as a failure, rather than a success, when they find something else.

College should be about learning and exploration and, if you are fortunate enough to “see the trees”—to discover art, music, philosophy, or archaeology—then you are incredibly lucky and you are more likely to be successful. At the very least, you will enjoy your academic work.

Don’t Try to “Find Your Passion”

Finding your passion used to be the advice given by many advisors. While some of us may be lucky enough to do this, for many of us it is hard to know what that might be, let alone what it means—especially if you are 18 to 22 years old. In a 2018 article for Forbes magazine entitled “‘Following Your Passion’ Is Dead – Here’s What To Replace It With”⁷, Michael Bohanes wrote:

“‘Finding your passion’ presupposes that interests and passions are fixed, rather than fluid and evolving as we age and gain wisdom and experience. Those who follow the fixed mindset are much more likely to give up when obstacles arise.”

Your passion might change over time, you may find a new passion, or you may have more than one. Ask yourself a series of questions, such as those below:

What areas do I excel in?

What do I like doing?

Do I want to spend my days with people or alone? Do I want a balance?

Do I like to write? Analyze data? Draw?

Do I want to supervise people?

Do I want a job I can leave at 5:00 PM or one that follows me home and takes up my time on nights and weekends?

Am I willing to travel and how often?

Do I want a job where I can move up easily or at all?

If Your Family Does Not Support You, Build a Second Family

I have met with students whose parents cut off funding or support because they were not following the path the parents laid out for them. For example, they are not following their parents’ wishes to attend medical school or law school, or they are not majoring in economics or computer science. Even more harshly, parents have cut them off because the student does not have a perfect 4.00 GPA. The student is on their own.

This was my experience; while I was fortunate that my parents did pay my tuition for my undergraduate education, I had little to no emotional support. I was someone who needed to build a second, more supportive family. I have been beyond fortunate over my lifetime to have wonderful friends and mentors who have always supported me through the many ups and downs I have faced. When I hit tough times, they were the people who were there for me. Different people at different times—some for decades.

I had a wonderful undergraduate instructor who I relied on for academic advice while I was in college. And as a graduate student, one faculty member more than anyone else, Dr. Sylvia Gaines, played a key role in my life and did so until she passed away in September 2020. She was my MA and Ph.D. advisor, and she also served the role of faculty instructor, mentor, colleague, dear friend, and mom. She was all those things to me (and to other students) and more.

If you are someone whose family is not supporting you, build a new family. It does not mean you disown your biological family or that you cannot still love them, if you choose to do so. If your old or current friends are not supportive, find friends who will support you. This choice also does not mean you have to ignore your older friends. It simply means they may not be your support network for college issues. This is okay.

Keep Your Mentors in Your Life

One of the common complaints of first-generation students is that their parents or guardians, though supportive, cannot help them with certain things because they do not understand the ins and outs of college life. A student once told me that his father was supportive of him attending college, but calling him to vent was not helpful. Having never attended college, his father could not understand the pressure of writing a 15-page final paper because he was never in this situation. He father could not understand what it was like to also have several final exams at the same time because he also never took final exams. The student said it was more exhausting to have to explain all this to his father than to just plow through without the assistance of someone to listen.

It is essential to find good mentors. That person might be one of your faculty members, a dean, or an advisor; there are always people who can help you. Every college offers help, some more than others. If there is no formal program, do the work yourself. Make it a point to connect with one faculty member every semester. At the end of two years, you should know four faculty members well—faculty who you can go to for advice and information. My office tells students to collect advisors; the more the better. Collect their advice and then figure out what works best for you. Only you will know what is best.

Build a Diverse Support Network

This step is essential and an extension of the advice just above. Even the smallest college is a big place compared to most high schools. Smaller colleges may have one person that can help but, in many cases, the support systems will be large and decentralized. Students will need to see different people for different things: financial help, study abroad guidance, writing help, selecting a major, etc. So as you collect advisors and build your “go-to” network, be sure you have different people to help with different things.

I attended a workshop a few years ago and the leader talked about “building a presidential cabinet.”⁸ She developed a worksheet and asked her students to list the name of someone they went to for various kinds of advice: academic, personal, financial, love, emotional support, exercise, etc. She added, “If you listed your mother or your best friend (and if they are the same person) under every item, you have a problem.” Yes, while we moms are wonderful at doling out advice, students in college should have a list of people (personal and professional) that they can ask for advice. Then they, again they, get to choose what works best for them. And, of course, it is not going to be perfect. This is how we learn, advance, and do better next time.

Maintain Your (Good) Relationships with Family and Friends

Friendships should sustain us, support us, and hold us up. I would not be where I am or who I am without the amazing friends I have had, and still have, in my life. I still remember the life-altering comment my counselor said to me once as I was trying to work through my family issues. After numerous sessions of hearing my story (and convincing me not to underestimate the abuse I had endured), she said, “Why are you working so hard to get these dysfunctional people back into your life?”

I immediately replied, “Because they’re my family.”

Her response? “Sometimes you need to make a new family.”

It took me a long time to realize how right she was. I did not disown my biological family, but I finally realized they would never value or support what I did or who I was. I found people who did.

There is a difference, I think, between a fight you have with a relative you have always been close to, be it your mother, father, sibling, or guardian, and pursuing relationships that are abusive, dysfunctional, or simply never worked well. People with healthy families would sometimes tell me, “You really should make up with your [insert mother, father, sister].” But I knew, as do others in my situation, that that was impossible. It was never about forgiveness over one thing they did; it was about the absence of any healthy relationship to repair. It was about the abuse I endured, which meant that I had to distance myself from them to survive and thrive.⁹ I never cut them off completely and I was with them both at the end of their respective lives.

I would also hear “You’re going to feel really awful when your [again, insert mother, father, sister] dies.” I never thought I would, and I did not. I was sad when my father died, I cried. I felt sad for him because I knew how much he wanted to keep on living. But I had the same regrets I had my entire life; I wished it could have been different. I did, finally, come to terms (at least almost) with my childhood. And that is mainly because I worked incredibly hard, especially after a divorce, to be happy. I worked through what happened. I learned to enjoy life and to be grateful. My children and my friends made this possible.

Not all friendships are healthy and stable ones. Do not be afraid to distance yourself from people who do not support you or value you. Find the people who will always have your back.

Always Ask for Help and Use It

Asking for help is one of the things that I see students struggle with frequently. When they are reluctant to ask for assistance, I tell them that asking for help is a sign of strength and not a sign of weakness. How do you learn if you don’t ask? How do you innovate, build relationships, advance if you don’t ask about what you don’t know? Perhaps this reluctance ties back to students being told they were great at everything. If one is great at everything, one should never need help, right? But no one is good at everything, and we all have questions and need help at points along the way.

College is a major transition for all students; it is a big leap from high school, even for those who went to the best high schools, come from supportive homes, and have parents or guardians who attended college. In most high schools, there is guidance for getting to college, but once there, students may still find themselves on their own to navigate the system. If their parents have always done everything for them, then their days are filled with multiple calls home to ask how to do things ranging from laundry to picking classes and a major.

This need for help from home comes with mixed emotions for parents. We all want to feel needed so when our child calls home and asks for help, it is a wonderful feeling. However, if they call home multiple times a day to report in or to ask questions that they should be able to find the answers to on their campus, then the situation switches to one of enabling. Chapter 5 presented some of the experiences I witnessed where the parent was doing all the work for their child during college. Sometimes the child is not aware of their parent’s actions and sometimes the child requests parental involvement because they do not know what to do. I do not think any of us want to raise children who cannot function in the world when they are in their late 20s or beyond. We want to know they will thrive and have a happy and secure life long after we are gone. That likely will not happen if the parent continues to do everything after their child leaves home.

College is Hard

In his opening address to parents and students, the President of UVA, James E. Ryan, discusses college being a big transition for every new student and that it can be hard. His analogy, which I think is perfect, is to an individual or a couple who are expecting their first child. (This advice is for parents and guardians!) All expectant parents hear about how wonderful parenting is, how glorious it will be, how it will change their life for the better. Yet anyone who has either given birth to or parented a newborn knows that, while there is incredible joy and wonder in those early years, there is also exhaustion and frustration. It is hard. The endless crying, feedings, dirty diapers, throwing up, sleepless nights, sickness, worry, etc. These difficulties are rarely talked about until well after the child is born. This tendency is likely for good reason because the alternative would be, “Congratulations! Expect to be exhausted, stressed, and frustrated for the next several years or even for the rest of your life because you will never, ever stop worrying about your children!”

College is the same, he says. “Best four years of your life,” you will hear people say. “You’ll have a blast; it’s so much fun!” While these statements are often true, college is hard work and a big adjustment for most people. The classes are challenging, the newly found independence is hard for many young adults to manage. The first year is the toughest, but no college welcome talk addresses this fact. In higher education, we rarely talk about how difficult the adjustment period can and will be, academically, socially, and culturally until much later. And we should… and earlier. We offer help, support, and classes on how to navigate the campus and study, but we do not normalize the fact that almost everyone will need these tools. As we see more first-generation college students enter universities, this support becomes even more critical. We need to tell students that it is okay to struggle with the adjustment because there is help of all kinds for them including academic advice, financial help, social adjustment help, mental health, etc.

You will Stumble, Fall and/or Fail—Learn, and Get Back Up

College, and life, will not always go according to plan. You will succeed, you will falter, and you will fail. But you need to be able find the strength to get back up, learn, correct, and move forward—with help as needed. That help can come from family, friends, faculty, and/or professional counselors. Talk to people and write in a journal; these are great ways to process and to think about what went wrong and what it means. But do not dwell. This last step has been something that has not come easily to me. It takes work. It is hard not to have regrets about something, but it is important to analyze, learn, and move on.

After my father died, there was a huge event to honor him in New York. It opened with a guest speaker and a fashion show (if you read Chapter 1 you may remember he was a hairdresser and business owner). The guest speaker was a motivational speaker and, while I do not remember his name, I remember much of what he said. The room was filled with hairdressers and the speaker talked about the importance of connections. As an example, he mentioned the few professions where you can legally and ethically touch someone else in the workplace: doctor, dentist, physical therapist, massage therapist and… hairdresser. While I found that an odd, though correct, analogy, he went on to talk about how much people trust their hairdressers and I know that to be true. We share personal information with them, we bring our children to them, and if our children happen to stay in the same town, they bring their children to the same person. They establish strong bonds and loyalty. That all made sense.

Then he switched gears a bit and began talking about regrets; he said he found it troubling that so many people said, “I have no regrets about anything.” He said something like, “So you did everything right throughout your whole life? You wouldn’t change anything? You have no regrets?” I immediately disagreed with his point of view for several reasons. While I think most of us have some (or many) regrets about something we said or did or a decision we made, I do not have a problem with someone saying they have no regrets. If they are at a point in time where they are happy and they have had a good life so far, whether they are 25, 40, 60 or 80, then all their decisions, good and bad, helped to get them to that point and they do not need to have any regrets because they likely learned along the way. So, even if you have made mistakes, if you have been lucky enough to learn from them and did what was best at the time, then maybe you are lucky enough to say, “I have no regrets.” It does not mean your life was perfect or that you made no mistakes; it means you are content in the moment.

Faculty Expectations

One of the many adjustments students make when they transition from high school to college is dealing with college professors and instructors. Faculty and teaching assistants are different than high school teachers. Understanding and getting to know your professors can help a student be successful in college.

A student’s relationship with professors should be one of give and take. There are things that students want from them (like knowledge, a professional contact, perhaps a letter of recommendation), but there are also things faculty want from students. If you know the general rules, you are more likely to get what you want from the relationship. These relationships often last for years, even lifetimes, and can be of great value throughout one’s life, long after one graduates.

Here are a few facts I gathered over the years from my own experiences and those others that I frequently share with students at orientation.

Faculty Want to Impart Their Wisdom to You

In most cases, faculty chose the field in which they are teaching to be their life’s work. Often, they chose the field before they chose to be an educator. They do research and they write articles and books on the topic. In short, almost all faculty are very embedded in their areas of expertise. Respect that; be alert in class, ask questions, and do the work.

Faculty Love Their Own Subject Area and They Want You to Love it Too

Faculty lecture on the topics that they are most passionate about and that they believe are most important to teach. You may or may not share that passion, but you should respect it. Showing up for class shows them that you care. Staying awake and asking an occasional question doesn’t hurt, either. Going to see them during their office hours might seal the deal.

Go to Class—All of Them

Reading as a substitute for showing up to class is a losing proposition. In fact, lecture content and textbook readings may have very little in common. Learning that the book does not cover the same material as discussed in class can be a painful lesson if you choose sleep over attending class. Go to every class, sit up front, ask questions (if permitted) and stay awake.

On Faculty Testing

College faculty test your knowledge about the things that they believe are most important. In some cases, the test may come more from the lecture than from the assigned reading. They will look for understanding rather than rote memorization and they might ask test questions to determine if you grasp the material beyond the surface facts.

College faculty rarely grade on your effort, they grade on whether or not you know the material. In high school, a student can sometimes get away with a plea of “But I worked so hard on this assignment” or “But I studied for days.” In college, this rarely matters. If a test is multiple choice or true/false, as many are in large college classes, then your grade is your grade and there is little to no room for negotiation. If the assignment was a paper in which you earned a B-, an argument of “But I worked so hard on this paper and I should have an A” will carry little to no weight. The response will likely be “While you may have worked hard on this paper, it’s still a B- paper.”

Faculty Chose to Teach at The College Level to Educate Adults

College faculty have no desire to be disciplinarians, nor will they waste valuable class time with non-academic issues. If you sleep through an exam or show up on the wrong day, they may or may not allow you to make up the work.

Faculty Do Not Always Take Attendance

In large classes, the faculty may not chase after you to get your homework or ask why you were not in class. They assume that you are an adult and that you will do what you need to do. You need to take responsibility for your college education. Nobody else will. You need to police yourself to make sure you are doing what is necessary to achieve the results you want. If you have a problem or a question, it is your responsibility to meet with the instructor and not expect that they will seek you out. Some faculty will take attendance and others will not. In large classes, it is easy to feel as if no one will notice whether you are present or not, but it matters for you! Many faculty will take attendance with iClickers¹¹ or give a pop quiz which you cannot make up for if you are not in class. The main point is that if you do not attend classes, you will miss a great deal of key knowledge and information.

Stay Calm

Stay calm, even if you find a particular professor especially intimidating and the class average on the first exam is 53%. Some college professors want you to “stretch” and get your attention with hard work early on in the semester. At the end of the semester, however, you may see a curve on their tests; not everyone will fail. So stay calm and keep at it. Ask for help, attend office hours. You will probably end up with a better grade than you thought (if you beat the curve on the tests). If you are really having problems, it may help to discuss withdrawing from the class with your advisor.

What Irritates Faculty?

Students not attending class, talking in class, and/or sleeping in class
Students doing other work, watching movies, and/or shopping online during class
Lack of interest, motivation, and/or responsibility
Not reading the syllabus or e-mail
Excuses (own your mistakes!)
Missing deadlines
Begging for better grades because you “need” them

Avoid the above behaviors!

Take the Jobs That Come Your Way/Do the Jobs No One Wants (Even in College)

There are two related parts to this piece of advice. Students sometimes think that when they graduate from college, their dream job will be waiting for them with a six-digit salary. For some new graduates it might be, for most it is not. I worked many jobs along the way to my current job that provided me with a range of experiences that I could leverage. Some students look for that dream internship that lands them the perfect job when they graduate. Again, this outcome may happen for some students, but not for all. Some students will never be able to afford an unpaid internship because they must work over the summer and winter breaks. They almost always underestimate the value of this work, whatever it is.

As an undergraduate student at Temple University, I earned money by lifeguarding and teaching swimming lessons. These are not uncommon jobs for a teenager or college student, but students often do not place value on jobs like these when they could and should. The same is true of other kinds of work.

How do you leverage the skills earned from lifeguarding or teaching swim lessons? Most universities have a career center that can help students translate work into a solid list of skills on a resume. As an example, if you work at a restaurant, ask what else you can do. Can you help with marketing and advertising? Can you shadow the person who does payroll? Help interview future employees?

The second part of this piece of advice is to be willing to do the work no one else wants to do. But do not just do it, do it and improve it. Improve the work, the product, and the process—whatever it is. Change it from something no one wants to do to something everyone wants to do. When I was in the first year of my job as an Assistant Dean, the office produced a paper student handbook that was compiled for all new students. When the person who had produced it left, someone else was asked and said no as the work was too menial. I had done a fair amount of editing as a graduate student, and even on an ad hoc basis when my children were little, so I volunteered. They slightly increased my salary for taking it on since I was only part-time at the time. I enjoyed this kind of work as I found it calming. I liked the collecting of information, the proofreading, and the organization. I improved the look of the handbook and changed the way it was organized. I believe it is one of the things that helped me secure a full-time position in the office. The other person was not renewed.

Don’t Look Back

“Call Your Mom”

Yes, after all this advice about letting go, you should “call your mom” (or dad, guardian, aunt, uncle, grandparent, etc.). But do not call to ask what to do; call to tell them what you are doing, what you are thinking, and what you are learning. Call them to tell them about the amazing book you just read in your literature class; to tell them about the lab you completed in organic chemistry; the play you saw with your drama class. Share this with them; your excitement will be contagious. Don’t forget to ask about their life too.

Summary

I hope you found this advice useful and that it will help you to be more successful. I can also boil it down to three simple things to do:

1. Go to all your classes, sit up front, and be involved.
2. Ask for help when you need it.
3. Learn to manage your time and work hard at getting things done early.

References