3 College Organization Tips

Grade school and high school teachers are great for teaching subject matter and helping students get through core material, and some serve as excellent mentors to guide their charges to bigger and better things. You probably have at least one teacher you look back at with fondness and gratitude. However, one area in which the school system and teachers typically lack at providing are providing life skills. For example, tips on paying taxes and how to become more organized are things that typically get lost in the shuffle. But they shouldn’t.

Why Organization is Important

Organization is a key pillar to just about every type of success there is. Being more organized will help you in school, in work, in athletics, in hobbies, and in relationships (yes, even relationships — just consider how annoyed you get when your boo is always late or forgets altogether a data you had). And becoming more organized is something anyone can do. That’s because organization is a habit and the more you perform a habit, the more ingrained it becomes until you’ll start unconsciously look to keep your life more organized.

If this is a habit you’ve been struggling with, then college is an excellent time and place to start. Start today with these college organization tips:

1. For every class, a folder and notebook.

While yes, some people thrive on a one giant binder with everything in it, for most people that gets too chaotic. Most people will find that the key to school organizational success is breaking things up as it promotes better focus and compartmentalize tasks. Having one folder for each class to put in assignments along with a matching sprial-bound notebook for notes is ideal.

Create a desk area in your Junction Cottages & Townhomes apartment and put something to organize your folders in one of the corners. A simple milk crate tipped so the open side faces you will work well, or you might purchase something like this desk organizer. Whichever you choose, spend the next two weeks conciously taking only the notebooks and folders you need to class and promptly returning them to your organization station when you’re done. Soon, keeping your notes and papers organized in this manner and having them with you will become second-nature. As a bonus tip, get different colors for each subject but ensure your folder and notebook for each subject are the same color.

2. Block out 30 minutes every night to ready stuff for the morning.

Waking up early is hard when you’re a young adult — but it’s not your fault. Due to teenage-onset hormonal changes that last until one is in their mid-20s, most young adults have an altered circadian rhythm that naturally has them wanting to stay up longer and wake up later. It’s important to recognize this as the knowledge of it can help inform why you have some bad habits (always running out the door late in the morning). And once you understand your bad habits, you can move to change them into good ones.

If you struggle with mornings, it may be because you aren’t properly organized and ready for it. Your alarm goes off and things are chaotic as you rush to get everything together and get yourself out the door. The key here, then, is to make things easier on yourself by prepping the night before. If 30 minutes sounds like too much, start with just 15 minutes of conscious prepping that includes: Packing your backpack with your notebook, folder, textbook, and any other times for your first class the day before. And secondly, picking out an outfit (and maybe a backup one if you wake up not feeling the first) and having it ready on a chair.

Once you’ve done the above two prep things for two weeks straight, extend your prep time to thirty minutes and consider including things like having breakfast ingredients ready to cook. Or pack yourself a snack and lunch to eat post-first period class. These types of day-before-prepping will make waking up and getting out the door less stressful and less stress means better mornings overall.

3. Get a LARGE calender.

Portable calendars and calendar apps are excellent organizational devices, but you must be dedicated and have good input habits to use them. They aren’t easy for those who lack organizational skills. Especially because they are small or can only be activated by actively opening up the app, it’s easy to forget about them.

So, if the above are things you’ve struggled with, then consider grabbing a massive calendar. Hang it up on your closet door or next to your desk, wherever is easiest for you to access. The trick to this is that the more visible you have it, the more likely you are to use it, and the more you use it to track big events like test days and group projects, the more organized you’ll get and the better you’ll do.

Organization Starts With a Clean Place

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