Office Hours

Getting to know your professor is a good idea. Whether it is through email, or having coffee with him, or office hours. I have had a variety of teachers. There are the teachers that really don't have the time for office hours and email is the best way to get a hold of them. Some teachers want to be social and meet you at the coffee shop on campus instead. It's less formal, but it makes them more approachable. (Making up words.)  But the best way to talk to your professor is in office hours. I have had to make appointments before but usually just warn the professor that you are coming in so they know to be there.

If you are having trouble in a class, talk to the professor. They never want to see their student fail so they will help you (most teachers, some just suck.) Currently, I am not doing too good in one of my classes and I have emailed my professor to talk about it and he wants me to come in and see how I'm studying and we are going to crunch numbers and see what we can do. Teachers usually want to help, so let them. Last year my teacher for English had every student make an appointment with him to talk about our essay and see how we can improve it. Which is amazing. Of course this was at a small private school, you won't see that at a university.

Get to know your professor! More than just for help and good grades but also for recommendations or references. Not all professors are evil. They come in handy.

College student, Y U NO GET PROPER REST?!?!?

Seriously, why do we stay up so late? All we get out of it is being exhausted the next day. Yeah, maybe you got studying done, but if procrastination didn't get the best of us, then we wouldn't be up so late. See what I did there? I showed you how everything goes hand and hand. If you write down all of your assignments with the due dates, get it all done on time without procrastination, then you would get the proper amount of sleep. You may think you can work ok with less sleep than what you are told you need.
In reality teens, and yes you are still a teen, up till about 22 years old need at least 8 hours of sleep to properly function. After 22, 6 hours is sufficient. The younger teens need 10 hours and the younger you are, the more sleep you need. Something you may not know about sleep deprivation, you will die from sleep deprivation before starvation. It takes 10 days without sleep to kill you while it takes 14 days of no food to kill you. Weird, huh?

Moral of this blog, get your sleep people. Even though I am up at 4 in the morning writing this. I am on Spring Break and doing school work instead of going out and getting wasted. "You aren't the only thing getting wasted."

Peace and Love
Marina

Procrastination Killed the College Student

This statement is not a joke. The longer you wait to do something, the more stuff piles up. You should see my room right now. But luckily spring break is here!!!!

When you put off writing a paper, you keep putting it off "I'll do it tomorrow, or Saturday." And next thing you know its due in 14 hours. Once you get an assignment, write it down in your planner or on your to-do list (I have both) and put a deadline before the actual deadline. You will not feel as stressed. I promise. Let everything build up for a week and then try to get it done in 2 days on top of work if you have that and on top of having a life.

Get your stuff done, on time, so you can have fun on the weekends. That's what they are there for.

Peace and love.

Marina

Having a Bad Day

So from time to time you may have a bad day. Maybe you showed up late for a test due to traffic, failed a test miserably, almost got ran over and into 2 wrecks at the same time (I'm not meat to your car sandwich, I am bigger than you). Can you tell I had a bad day yet? I feel its important to let everyone know that the day is only 24 hours and it will eventually end. Yes, I vented to everyone, but it reassured me that its going to be okay.

So I didn't wake up late but traffic decided to be so much worse than usual today. Fortunately, I have a pretty cool professor and he still let me take my test.  That wasn't the test I failed, yes, I understand I can't to amazing on all of them but shit. That grade made me cry! I have never done that bad. I emailed my professor and he is going to help me of course, thank God. On top of that, I was telling a friend from that class and we had planned to study for that test together, but I had work. I told him how horribly I did and he demanded I take off work for the next test, he did MUCH better than I did. So this is so helpful to study with someone who knows but they are doing.

Idiots on the road cannot be helped. And I don't understand why people can't just keep moving forward when driving. Whatever.

At the end of the day, there is a new one coming around the corner. Don't be upset for too long, its one day. Venting to someone or everyone helps. Screaming in your car helped a good bit and just breath.

Stay happy and stay healthy.

Marina

Advocating and Organizations

My journey at the University of Houston really has just begun. Last week we had the Carneval of Cultures showing so many different aspects of so many different cultures. I was truly amazed by what I never knew about everyone else. Of course 25 different cultures foods mixing together didn't smell too good. But I started noticing since then the diversity of organizations and clubs around campus. LGBT, Invisible Children, Vision School, etc. I am not a lesbian or bi sexual but I am for equal rights and signed a petition for faculty to receive the same benefits as straight faculty, which I thought was awesome for students to do.

Lately, and most of you may have noticed, Joseph Kony is becoming very famous. For those of you who do not know who Joseph Kony is, YouTube "Kony 2012" and the first result is what you should watch, have 30 minutes to spare to watch it though. This campaign to save children from Uganda and many different countries is Africa. Joseph Kony is destroying families and countries. The only way to take him down is to make him famous and that is exactly what the goal of one man is. Let's help Africa and take this man down.

Visit www.invisiblechildren.com for more information.

Get involved in campus organizations if you aren't already. It's a great way to meet new people, add to your resume, networking and possibly some extra credit for your classes.

Always and Forever,

Marina