Try to make sure you leave an open hour around midday so that you have time to get food in you. A lot of people forget to do this. If you have to have back to back classes, check your syllabus or with your teacher—some midday classes allow you to bring in a drink and a snack. Some will even allow you a full meal.
If you can get an online/pdf copy of the book without busting the bank, DO IT. Sometimes there are even annotated versions online. This can make notetaking a shitton easier, because you can highlight printed-out versions of the book and they won’t dock you on the money back. Sometimes professors move through their lecture too fast for you to write stuff down. Shrugging off that old ‘don’t ruin your books’ rule you had in high school may be your only hope.
UNLESS YOU NEED THEM OR REALLY WANT TO KEEP THEM TRY TO SELL BACK YOUR BOOKS—maybe even offer them online to incoming students. You won’t get nearly the worth of them but someone after you will thank you a million times over for providing a used copy. If you take good notes, you can sometimes buy/sell those as well. A lot of professors teach literally the same class every time.
IF YOUR PROFESSOR PUTS NOTES ONLINE GET THEM. GET THEM NOW. TRUST ME. YOU WANT THOSE NOTES. Bring them in with you if it’s possible to get them before class.
Keep change on hand. Always.
The Best Way To Make Friends:
Bring a printer with you to college and offer to print people’s stuff for half of what the school does or for free if you can afford it.
Carry around small candies with you and offer them to people while waiting outside of class. If you are the ‘candy person’ this gives you an in for starting conversations.
Buy a jumbo pack of chalk and find an open sidewalk on a free day. Write the words ‘Come draw with me?’ and begin doodling.
Last But Not Least: if you go onto campus and you can’t find what you’re looking for, and you are afraid to go up to someone and ask, find an open, well-populated area, hold your schedule/map in hand, and walk in circles for a few minutes, looking up and around in obvious confusion. Other students know this body language well. Someone will stop and point you in the right direction. (if you are worried that the person’s directions are a joke or faulty, wait for them to leave and take up the stance again; if the directions match-up the second time, they’re legit; do not allow a person to ‘show you the way’ unless EVERY STEP is along an obvious walkway, just in case)
For those of you who fear assault, most campuses aren’t much for small blades or mace. Carry a pocket air horn or a hand bag of those little pop-rock fireworks unless you can get a concealed weapons permit.
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