Lesson 1: Going, Arriving and Getting Around
Choosing your workload and building a schedule
Depending on your program and school you likely have to sign up for courses yourself, building your own schedule. Try to limit the amount of classes to a maximum of five per semester, if you are a science student you might want to make it four. In that case there is a good chance you will spend a few hours in a lab every week, which does cut down on your time. If you actually do not know yet what you want to eventually take and you have the opportunity to choose majors at the end of your freshman year you have to keep certain things in mind:
College is expensive, it doesn’t matter if you pay by the credit or by the year, you don’t want to spend too much time before graduating. So you want to make educated choices about your future. Now even if you have to pick a major before actually starting you can always change majors later on; you are by no means attached to whatever you chose for the rest of your life. If you have no idea and still have to pick something, that being a major or courses, there is something you most likely do know: the direction you want to go into. You most probably do know if you want to be in engineering or arts. Generally you also know whether or not you despise math or languages. At least you will know what you like the least.
Get a complete list of programs offered at your college, and the courses you have to take for each (if you have to pick them yourself and you are not assigned a fixed schedule). If you are planning to go into business look at the different options in that field (commerce versus economics or management). Make a list of the courses that are required for each program you could possibly ever be interested in. Highlight the courses that are the same for each program. For example; whether you choose to be in management, economics or commerce you will always have to take a first year economics course. Whether you are in chemistry, biological chemistry, biotechnology or molecular biology you will always need a first year chemistry and biology course.
Don’t feel like you have to take all courses listed under “first year”. Most people do not take six courses in college if they want a good average or to even pass. Ask around what the minimum and maximum is you are allowed to take and go somewhere in between, that is a safe guess. If you are allowed to drop a course (generally drop dates are about a month after classes start), it is safer to try one more than one less; you can always drop a course and take it later if it gets too busy. You will not be able to add on a course later on if you feel your workload is too light.
If you plan to have a part time job also calculate that into your course load; being full time student is meant as a ‘full time job’. So treat it as one. It is generally advised not to work for more than ten hours a week in a side job.
Now; once you've highlighted all courses that are equal between the programs you might be interested in you select the 4 or 5 courses that all programs share. This way you can change your mind about your major later on without having taken a class you end up not needing at all! It saves time and money, not to mention the impact it can have on your grades.
There are a few very important things to note when choosing courses. If you are not sticking to the exact amount listed under “fist year” requirement, because you want to have a lighter course load or for other reasons, it is important to see which courses are prerequisites to your senior year courses.
For example; first year economics is a prerequisite (you must have taken and passed the course, sometimes even with a particular grade in the course) to be able to take a future higher year class. Some upper year biology courses actually do not require a first year biology class; rather they require first year chemistry! You want to choose your classes accordingly so that you do not end up loosing a year because you lack a prerequisite for a particular course.
This can be tricky; hopefully your college offers a logical listing of courses with the appropriate course requirements, if you cannot find it contact your school and find out. This is your future, and there is not a single student who did not take a course they did not need. You can try and learn from that to avoid this happening, or at least limit the number of courses you might not need in the end. It is extremely common that people make mistakes when choosing courses in first year, but using this strategy you will not be one of them!
Something else to consider, specifically for science students, is the number of classes you will have with laboratory components. Not only are labs mandatory, in virtually every case you will have to hand in some sort of report or write-up. They can greatly vary in length and time commitment, which is something you will not know before starting the class. To be on the safe side keep in mind that for any laboratory section you need an average of three to four additional hours of preparation and report writing time. As a rule of thump stick to about two lab sections in your freshman year, if you have a choice at all. You are going to be going through so many changes and you will have to focus on acquiring the right study skills so you want to have a healthy dose of pressure but not overload yourself.
People who overload themselves in their freshman year are more likely to drop out or become depressed. You have your health to consider, and not just the record time in which you want to finish your degree. It will be hard to juggle spare time, school and work. Make a schedule to help yourself out. You are not going to stick to that schedule, but it will give you an idea of your availability. Don’t think you can work for ten hours straight though!
Also factor in travel time between classes and from your job to school. First thing to put on this schedule are your class times. Then add in your part time job. If you do not have one yet, see which hours will be most convenient for you based on your class schedule.
Unless you really have no other option, try not to work for more than ten hours a week. That should be an absolute maximum. Look at it this way; the more you work the longer you will probably need to finish school and get a ‘real’ job.
After scheduling in those work hours, look at what you have left. Schedule in study hours, count at least 4-5 hours a week per class. That is a minimum and you will probably not get away with any less. If after all this it looks like you will have no time to eat or sleep, you know right off the bat that you are overloading yourself. Either drop a course if you can, or opt for less working hours. This is also just an estimate, so don’t panic right away when you see your ‘schedule’. It is really a very personal thing and your own schedule will establish itself after you start your classes. There is no real way to predict how many hours of studying you will need to do, or how heavy the course load is. Some courses hardly require an hour a week of studying, while others never seem to end.
Use this lesson as a tool to determine how many hours of spare time you will have at the very most, and to see if your class schedule is not too full. A class with just a one hour lecture a week can actually be quite intensive, so don’t feel like that means you can easily add on another course.
