University is very different from school. You already know that. But what does this mean when preparing for a new year at university? It means you might need to change how you prep. These are the top suggestions for preparing for a year at university from the FoondaMate team.

Choose your organisation method ✏️✏️✏️

Make sure you have a plan for how you are going to organise all of your work. Here are some methods that could work:

1. Make a binder for each of your courses, with separators for lecture notes, tutorial notes, study notes, and assignments 📁📁📁.If you do use this system ❗make sure you file all your work at the end of each day❗. This will help you remain organised as the year goes on and will make it easier for you to access your earlier work later in the year.
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2. If you are a more digital person, make a large folder on your laptop/computer with separate folders for all your courses💻🖥🖱. Store your lecture notes in word document form in separate folders, and give a title for the topics each set of notes is based on so it easier for you to access📚🗃🗂. You can also store assignments in word document form in the separate course folders.
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3. 🌙 And of course, keep a to do list for every course. This can be digital or physical - but make sure you know what you need to do to stay on track! 🏃🏽🏃🏽🏃🏽

Plan for your deadlines 🗓️🗓️🗓️

This is probably the number one tip of a successful university semester. 1️⃣1️⃣1️⃣

As soon as your course outlines are released:

1. Go through them and find all your hand in dates and test dates 📆⏰
2. Put them on a big calendar that you stick on your wall 🗓️📝
3. And make sure that the due dates for all your courses are on the same calendar! ****📝🗃

It is very likely that you will have clashing deadlines for different courses (e.g. two tests for two different courses on the same day). This can be very stressful - but if you know about it in advance you will be able to prepare for both deadlines without worrying too much. ✅✅✅

If you have pre-reading - do it! 👓📚

One of the things that is different between university and school is that you will be expected to read. A LOT. 😅😬📚

And you will be expected to read on your own to prepare before each class. 👀😪

Making a habit of reading so much work can be a challenge 😭😭😭. But doing so will be to your advantage 🏆🏆🏆.

Why? 🤔 Because:

1. You will already know what’s going on in class. This means you will know exactly what you will find challenging and what you will need to pay special attention to and ask questions about during your lectures ✏️✏️✏️.
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2. These readings give more context to your lectures - which means you will understand more, and therefore get better marks. 🥇🥇🥇
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3. It enables you to ask intelligent questions in class - which will help you build good relationships with your lecturers. This will be very useful later in the semester if you need to ask for help, extensions on a deadline, or a reference letter when applying for jobs and bursaries. 🙋🏾‍♀️🙋🏾‍♀️🙋🏾‍♀️

So make sure you are doing as much pre-reading as possible before class, and schedule it in when you’re planning your weeks! 🚴🏾‍♀️🚴🏾‍♀️🚴🏾‍♀️