College students get a lesson in time management
Counselor LaDonna Porter gives a seminar to students
Victoria Morrison
Issue date: 11/10/08 Section: News
Juggling education and a personal life can be very difficult for college students, but in a recent seminar, counselor LaDonna Porter gave tips for time management to help students get back on track.
Porter, speaker and counselor for more than 14 years, held a seminar for students to help them make the most of their time. Porter advised that the trick to balancing a personal life, work and a grueling class schedule is simple, prioritize. She told students that life is all about goals.
"Students should write down their goals for the week, to a month, to a year and always keep record of them," Porter said. "You should always evaluate those goals. I like to cross out any goal or task I have done because it's very satisfying to see what I have accomplished being taken off my list."
Porter also recommended carrying a calendar to keep track of homework, weekly obligations, as well as other engagements.
"The best way to utilize a planner is to put deadlines on assignments, because if it's an assignment that you get two weeks to do, and you write the due date in that same date box, you won't see that it's due until you turn the page in your planner...and then you only have a week to do it," Porter said.
During the seminar, students were given packets with pages of information.
One which was especially useful, a page titled Time Tips, gave examples of 30 common, yet extremely beneficial tips for managing time. Looking for ways to free time was one example. Another page showed a table that can record every activity performed every half hour in a day.
"There are so many hours in a day; some students don't even realize they have that time until they record what they have done in 24 hours," Porter said. "Students waste so much time with television when they could be studying. Most of the time it surprises them at how much time they actually do have for important things."
Students should also know about themselves and their learning habits. Taking advantage of study groups to pool knowledge, and stay on top of schoolwork, should be a few of the main priorities. Also, if students know the ways in which they retain information the best, whether it is studying at night or using a tape recorder, it can be beneficial for sharpening learning skills.
Porter, speaker and counselor for more than 14 years, held a seminar for students to help them make the most of their time. Porter advised that the trick to balancing a personal life, work and a grueling class schedule is simple, prioritize. She told students that life is all about goals.
"Students should write down their goals for the week, to a month, to a year and always keep record of them," Porter said. "You should always evaluate those goals. I like to cross out any goal or task I have done because it's very satisfying to see what I have accomplished being taken off my list."
Porter also recommended carrying a calendar to keep track of homework, weekly obligations, as well as other engagements.
"The best way to utilize a planner is to put deadlines on assignments, because if it's an assignment that you get two weeks to do, and you write the due date in that same date box, you won't see that it's due until you turn the page in your planner...and then you only have a week to do it," Porter said.
During the seminar, students were given packets with pages of information.
One which was especially useful, a page titled Time Tips, gave examples of 30 common, yet extremely beneficial tips for managing time. Looking for ways to free time was one example. Another page showed a table that can record every activity performed every half hour in a day.
"There are so many hours in a day; some students don't even realize they have that time until they record what they have done in 24 hours," Porter said. "Students waste so much time with television when they could be studying. Most of the time it surprises them at how much time they actually do have for important things."
Students should also know about themselves and their learning habits. Taking advantage of study groups to pool knowledge, and stay on top of schoolwork, should be a few of the main priorities. Also, if students know the ways in which they retain information the best, whether it is studying at night or using a tape recorder, it can be beneficial for sharpening learning skills.
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