There are advertisements all over campus exclaiming how Florida State University (FSU) is a top 20 public school. Yet if I’m being honest, before coming to FSU, I was not the best student. It’s not that I was a bad student; I would just turn in the easiest assignments late, procrastinate for hours on end, and habitually slack off at the beginning of the semester just to try (and fail) to save my grade each December and May. However, during my freshman year at FSU, the combination of an increased workload and the opportunity to take classes I’m actually interested in helped me create a routine to succeed (or at least do a lot better) academically. With that being said, here’s how I would spend a productive day at FSU to have the ultimate academic weapon semester.
The first thing you’re going to do is head toward the Mina Jo Powell Green, into the amphitheater, and towards the music building where there are several sets of tables with chairs and umbrellas. This is the perfect place to sit earlier in the morning because it doesn’t get too hot until later. An optional step is to get a little treat at Frother’s Daughter, a coffee truck often parked nearby at Park Avenue and Copeland. Here you are going to write down every single due date, reading, project, homework, quiz, and anything else you can find on your classes’ Canvas pages and syllabi on Google Calendar, Notion, a planner from Target, or whatever works for you. If we’re being real, you might never be that person who starts a project two months or even two weeks in advance, but having all your work written down in one place really helps work not sneak up on you to prevent that mid-semester Stroz mental breakdown!
Let’s say you have class after this. Immediately after class, you’re going to head to Einstein Bros. Bagels to fuel you for the rest of the day. Given that class just got out, the Einstein’s line is basically going to be down to the Leach. What you’re going to do now is pull out your syllabus on the Canvas app and start your online readings if you have them. The twenty minutes you spend reading while waiting in line, combined with time in between classes, or waiting to meet someone, can add up in tackling lots of weekly readings. Also, I love to read the rules for being a friar in 13th-century Italy in line to get a Garden Avocado bagel sandwich!
Now if this hypothetical day is later in the semester when you have research paper deadlines creeping up, you’re going to go to Strozier next. Here, while you start searching online for sources for your papers, you can check out some physical books. For a research paper with a million different sources, I’ve found having tangible books can be really helpful. For one, FSU has a pretty large number of books in its library that aren’t available online. Secondly, it can be much easier to navigate a book than a massive PDF, since you can take your eyes off the screen you’ve been staring at for days straight during finals week. You can also write notes in the margins with sticky notes if you aren’t blessed with an iPad to take notes on documents digitally. This is also a great idea because you can have your mysterious Rory Gilmore moment between the bookshelves, or even pretend you’re at Hogwarts looking through the restricted section (Strozier’s fifth floor) for any information on forbidden spells (your random ENC2135 research paper topic).
As you leave Strozier, next head to Landis to find a good place to sit and journal — not about anything academic, just about your day or whatever’s on your mind. I think this is helpful because last year (and also this year), in my discussion-based classes, I found it difficult to express a thought out loud or recall words. I generally felt like I sounded like that one TikTok audio trying to get the class participation grade. I find that the practice of putting your thoughts into words over time actually makes academic writing and discussion posts easier since feeling less jumbled speaking in class and writing comes more naturally.
Apologies to my STEM girlies, as this advice applies mostly to more humanities-focused classes (I haven’t and will not take a math class past STA2023). Here’s to acing those liberal studies requirements and hoping I can follow my own advice!
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