Six years ago, in 2016, I acquired my first “agenda.” It was a small, colorful planner with cute designs and added flair, a perfect fit for a 7th grader like myself, who felt that I needed to get my entire life mapped out to a tee in order to be successful in my middle school career. Obviously. I traded in my school-issued journal for this immaculately designed planner, and I was golden. I don’t remember a time when I felt more organized than that moment. Years later, as a sophomore in college, I am still devoted to my paper heaven. My Erin Condren Academic Planner has saved my life numerous times and continues to make me the most productive individual I could possibly be. With all my information safely laid out in one space, with no worry of lost assignments or deleted documents, I can put my mind at ease that if something is due, I’m going to get it done.
Throughout high school, my planner was consistently at a level of glory, where I would include sticker themes into my weekly spreads and color-code academic subjects with colored markers. Was it over the top? Some may agree. Was it an utter waste of the little free time I had? Some may agree. However, to me, it was a part of my academic sanity. It made learning fun again. My planner put joy into the dreaded assignments and looming tests, because when your AP Biology final is color-coded bubblegum pink, and there is a rainbow sitting next to the study reminder, who doesn’t want to go straight to work?
When I reached the collegiate level of my academic career, the art toned down a bit for apparent reasons, as my time grew more constrained. During the pandemic, I even reached a mind-blowing point where I questioned the importance of the planner itself. I tried Microsoft To Do and found myself missing deadline after deadline, and scrambling to complete assignments. I also dipped into the Notability app and tried to recreate my paper planner digitally, using the templates the app provided. This proved ineffective and as shocking as that was to me in the new age of technology, I was oddly grateful that it did not work. In a world where everything is now digital, my spiral-bound planner, with its thick paper pages, and attached G-2 Pilot Pen, inspires me that the significance of paper is not lost. There is so much benefit to writing things down with a pen and paper, and the permeance factor of it is truly important. A planner that sits open on your desk day in and day out, open to the page of importance, is a planner that will be completed. A planner that is lost in the tabs of your MacBook, may fail.
While I understand that the paper method is definitely not a one-size-fits-all fix to organization or productivity, it is definitely worth trying if you find yourself struggling, as I did, with planning out your day-to-day life as a student. With so much on our plates, writing down the daily with an electric blue Sharpie pen may solve your problems. Not all, but just the one where you forget the paper that was due on a Sunday evening, or the lab report with an odd deadline of noon, the Friday after your night out.
Investing in the future may look like the latest technological advancement; however, on the off chance, it can also look like a paper planner from the Target dollar spot.
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