
Ask HN: how to kill it in university? - zxcvvcxz
I know there's got to be a ton of high achievers browsing around here. So I was wondering if you guys could share your wisdom in time management and effective work/study practices to really get the most out of university grades. Maybe even some tricks to "hack the system" so to speak.<p>My background: I'm in a tough engineering program where I take ~6-7 courses/semester, and I have a tough time sitting down to work for long periods of time. Often I find that going to class 9am - 6pm leaves me no energy to any work/study. Next year I will be specializing in electrical and computer engineering, so I really want to get my act together here.<p>In terms of motivation, I'm pretty good at going all-out for projects, but studying something just for the sake of doing well on an exam (what I should be doing now...) is just so damn hard for some reason.
======
Mz
I always made sure I was _really_ paying attention in class and tried to take
care of myself physically (I didn't party in college, made sure I slept
enough, etc) so I was able to focus like that. When studying, I would stop and
close my eyes and see if I could "repeat back to myself" what the key points
were of the last couple of paragraphs or so. If I couldn't, I would re-read
it. Before exams, I would review my notes and such but I never "crammed" for a
test. I found that making sure I really got it as I went along meant that some
review was helpful but cramming was not necessary (and I suspect cramming
where you get hopped up on caffeine and hardly sleep and all that is probably
counterproductive).

I also was good at taking tests. If you aren't good at that, do some googling.
Taking tests is not just about measuring what you know. It's also a skill you
can develop, especially tests for something like University where you tend to
run into some of the same formats and such over and over.

Best of luck.

PS if you need my advice credentialed: I graduated high school STAR student,
National Merit Scholarship Winner, state alternate for the Governor's Honors
program and was inducted into Mu Alpha Theta in 11th grade (the earliest you
can be inducted). I got other academic awards in college, though I remember
them less well and, well, dropped out and went and did other things for a long
time because college wasn't my highest priority. (I dropped out in part to go
figure out who I was other than an obnoxious brainiac -- being one of the top
students at the high school I attended while the rest of my life crashed and
burned was not a healthy experience for me.)

I'm kind of a snob who enjoys tearing apart poorly put-together arguments
written by folks who have a PHD.* Call it an obnoxious hobby. I try to be less
obnoxious than I used to be. I don't dislike PHD's per se. But those folks who
are jerks about it and think they are so superior to everyone around them
because they have a PHD and think they can then put out any old crappy
unsupportable opinion because we are supposed to kowtow to the letters behind
their name, yeah, those folks tend to end up not much liking me. (Blame it on
my father, a high school drop-out who taught at a college for a time while in
the Army and who used to take glee in correcting the spelling, grammar and
punctuation of notes sent home by college-educated public school teachers.
Right is right, regardless of your credentials or lack thereof.)

* Or other credentials. It's just an example.

~~~
hnhg
As someone with a PhD, to me it's nothing more than a few years of vocational
training for academia. It shouldn't really be a badge of honour.

~~~
Mz
Not everyone acts that way. Some folks with PHD's are really cool people. I
have begun to think that those folks who do act that way are fundamentally
insecure..or something.

Have an upvote.

------
SlightGenius
Planning is indispensable, it usually equates into time management as well.
Even though you won't follow through with the plan completely, it's always
good to have one.

Basically have a rough plan sketched out in your head what has to be done
tomorrow, this week, this month and how you'll go about doing it.

Example: Wake up 9am, shower & eat, study for an hour, class at 12, lunch,
gym, class at 4, study till 7-8, socialize after.

Make sure you account for burning out, so you plan for exercising and
socializing.

Analyze parts of your plan that didn't work out, figure out why, and try to
plan better next time.

I would even plan in skill acquisition, such improving studying habits. Learn
to become focused, while your studying at the library don't be socializing,
getting distracted every time someone walks by, or even letting unrelated
thoughts interrupt.

[http://www.easwaran.org/complete-instructions-in-passage-
med...](http://www.easwaran.org/complete-instructions-in-passage-
meditation-4-one-pointed-attention.html)

Study with other people. It'll help you gain realizations/insights, and a
deeper understanding quicker than you would yourself. Make sure you carefully
select who you study with though!

In addition, utilize some of the resources people have already posted on this
thread on how to improve your studying habits. Studying is a skill, and like
everything else you can optimize it. High achievers have just figured out the
best path.

------
jrockway
Don't take so many classes. You aren't going to absorb the content from 7
advanced courses a day.

If you are taking classes to get a degree as quickly as possible, you'll find
that five years from now you remember nothing and you wasted $200,000 or
whatever college is costing you.

------
sliverstorm
I had a bit of a rocky history in school, and looking back I think I can block
out the things that really hurt my performance.

1) Working part-time more than a handful of hours a week.

2) Having a girlfriend.

3) Not exercising and eating well.

Don't do those things, and you'll be off to a much better start.

(Having a s/o can arguably be good for mental stability and relaxation. Just
make sure you pick someone low-maintenance.)

P.S. Don't race to the finish. There's no big prize at the end of college,
it's not a race. Get everything out of it you can; there's little value in
taking as many classes as you can at the same time.

------
scottchin
Here are two things I would suggest just off the top of my head based on
personal experience going through an engineering undergrad, having gone
through grad school, and taught undergrad engineering courses.

1) Try to meet some people going through the same courses as you. I found it
tremendously helpful to have people to study/do assignments with. You will
have people to motivate you. And you will waste less time trying to figure out
certain things when you have someone to ask.

2) Your final year of courses is the best opportunity to get to know some
professors. This can help you a lot down the road if you want to apply to grad
studies, need an academic reference, get involved in some cool research, or
even get recruited into a prof's startup. Show your face at office hours, ask
some inquisitive questions in or after class, things like that. This is
something that I did not take advantage of while in undergrad but now that I
have been on the other end (teaching), I can see how this can open a lot of
doors for the student.

Also, in the engineering programs that I have seen, I found that the workload
dies down a little after second/third year. You also get used to working the
"triage" by then as well. Good luck!

------
zxcvvcxz
Thanks for the responses so far. I guess I should elaborate a bit more:

\- Yes, I do have to take 6-7 courses/semester. It's the program.

\- I've already spent most of my time thus far "enjoying myself" so to speak.
I'm not necessarily the nerd-kid going to engineering who needs to make
friends, I'm closer to the opposite and now that I appreciate my education I
want to take it more seriously.

\- Why GPA? Well I like competition for one, and I want to prove to myself
that I can excel at it despite the challenges. I guess I'm tired of pretending
I'm smart while only getting a 3.2 GPA. Plus I may want to get into a good
graduate school.

Someone mentioned something about test-taking: that's my main weakness for
sure. I do well on projects and assignments, but tests just destroy me. I get
too much "tunnel-vision" and seriously under-perform for the knowledge I have.

Also, what types of classes can/should be skipped? I feel like certain solving
courses are worthless for lecture (for example, beginning-level
electromagnetism which is well-documented online and reduces to a small number
of vector calculus equations and definitions). But I feel something like
computer organization is best attended.

~~~
a3camero
I don't know about your classes, but I did science at a fairly well known
Canadian tech school (now in professional school in Canada). I usually would
skip the last few weeks of school and study straight through at the library.
Studying ten hours a day instead of going to class worked for me.

Studying for exams is boring. It's easy to get distracted. I started off
timing myself with my watch on seven hour countdown. Every time I got up or
got distracted I would stop the clock. Builds good habits and after a while
you won't need the countdown and you'll gradually be able to study more hours
a day. 12 to 12...

Studying is a pretty individual thing but that's what worked for me.

------
skrebbel
Do you want high grades, or do you really want to learn something useful?

If I were you, I'd not worry so much about "getting the most out of of
university grades" and join the board of some student organisation instead. Or
start an evening startup. You'll learn plenty difficult engineering stuff also
if you get average grades. Meanwhile, you'll learn about the real world in a
safe environment, without the risk of having no money to buy food if you fail.

That said, if your main worry is to pass the exams at all (or to finish that
report, etc), I've learned two tricks: 1) start with the easy parts. Sounds
stupid, but it helps motivation tremendously. Especially works with reports
etc, but you can do the same with exercises while preparing for exams. 2)
Remember why you're doing this. I'll assume it's because you want to get the
degree, you want to show yourself that you can take on this difficult program,
because you know you can. Or something along those lines.

------
twp
It's really simple: read the syllabus.

The syllabus tells you so many things: \- what the lecturer considers
fundamental; \- what is optional; \- what you will be asked about in the exam.

The syllabus is better than any revision notes. At the end of the term, and at
least twice in the month before the exam you should read through it and put
each part into three categories: 1) stuff I know well 2) stuff I don't know
well 3) stuff I don't need to know Then, spend your time moving stuff from
category 2 to category 1. By the time the exam comes everything should be in
first category.

This system has two advantages: 1\. you learn what you need to pass the exam;
2\. you learn what the lecturer considers important. It's not cheating. If you
trust your lecturer to put the important stuff in the syllabus and you focus
on the important stuff then not only are you showing respect to your lecturer
but you are also learning the fundamentals for the next step. Do it.

------
astrofinch
I don't think I'm a very high achiever--I'm taking 4 classes this semester and
I'll probably get a 3.3 or something. But here's what works for me:

* Cramming/putting stuff off to the last minute helps with motivation. I did it too much and burned out. Find the right balance.

* Oftentimes I find that lectures are a really inefficient way to learn stuff. For example, in one class I can get through the slides of a 90-minute lecture in 45 minutes on my own, have more fun, and understand better. The key is actually getting myself to do this. Also, it's important to have a timer and glance at it frequently to make sure I'm keeping a 45-minute pace.

* Use triggers and condition yourself to concentrate on the triggers. For me it's original-flavor Trident gum + rainymood.com + somafm.com/play/groovesalad.

* I generally work in cycles: 50 minutes of work followed by a 10-minute break where I change my scenery and daydream. I rarely try to make myself work when I'm seriously not in the mood, as I don't get much done and I create a negative association. I don't hesitate to take much longer breaks if my morale or energy are really low.

* Every evening, I plan out the next day and have a rough idea of what I'm going to be doing at any given time. I generally don't follow my plan very well, but having a specific thing that I'm supposed to be doing seems to lower my activation energy for tuning out distraction. I use cron to open a tab in my browser reminding myself to make a plan, and I stick my tongue out until it's done.

* I'm pretty good at sleeping 8 hours a night. I think this helps me because it increases the portion of my days on which I feel energetic.

* Studying with other students always helps with motivation.

Why are you taking so many classes? At my university you need special
permission to take more than 5 or so.

This site is probably good for more advice: <http://calnewport.com/blog/>

~~~
experimental
"* Use triggers and condition yourself to concentrate on the triggers. For me
it's original-flavor Trident gum + rainymood.com +
somafm.com/play/groovesalad."

Can you elaborate on this/reword?

~~~
astrofinch
Yes. Whenever I want to concentrate, I choose something to work on, set a
50-minute timer, pop in some gum, and turn on the rain noises and ambient
music. Then I focus like hell for 50 minutes until the timer rings, take a
10-minute-break where I walk to another room and daydream, and repeat.

The idea here is to leverage classical conditioning. Just like Pavlov
conditioned his dogs to drool on the bell, you want to condition yourself to
focus when you're chewing original-flavor Trident gum and listening to rain
noises and ambient music. This means that if at any time during the 50 minutes
you feel your concentration starting to slip significantly, take out the gum
and turn off the sounds. This is so you can avoid ruining your trigger. You
want the association between gum + rain + ambient music and Getting Stuff Done
to be as strong as possible.

I didn't choose these triggers at random, by the way. See the following links:

For chewing gum: [http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/redefining-
stress/200902...](http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/redefining-
stress/200902/retraining-the-adhd-brain)

For ambient music:
[http://www.reddit.com/comments/6l9t9/best_background_music_f...](http://www.reddit.com/comments/6l9t9/best_background_music_for_programming)

For rainymood.com:
[http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/805cp/need_some...](http://www.reddit.com/r/programming/comments/805cp/need_some_space_and_quiet_for_your_coding_but/c07vsae)

But you can certainly choose your own set of triggers if you like. Just one
might be enough.

------
jodoherty
Do you have to take so many courses? If you want to do well in your classes,
you should be able to dedicate at least an hour or so outside of class to
studying and homework for every hour of lecture time that you have. That gives
you time to really get into the material and reinforce it in your own way.

Otherwise, you'd have to make a lot of compromises with things like hobbies,
socializing and networking, mastery of the material, and even your personal
health.

A good hobby and some socializing will ward off depression and keep you
feeling upbeat and motivated. Friends can also support you when you're down.
This is key to preventing burn outs.

Networking will give you the contacts you need to find opportunities to apply
what you learn in school -- otherwise all you can do is apply to open job
offers and try to compete resume to resume against all the other recent
graduates many of whom will look exactly like you on paper.

A mastery of the material in earlier courses will make the future coursework
and material much easier to grasp and work through. You can't do this if
you're juggling too many courses and constantly worrying about grades. Think
of it as a feedback loop -- the harder you make it to master the earlier
course material, the harder the remaining courses will become. Learn to make
the difficulty curve work for you, not against you.

Finally, maintaining your personal health will allow you to live a longer,
better life. You'll look better, feel better, and more importantly, think
better. You're young, so yes, you can bounce back from a bad year or two, but
get into a habit of taking good care of yourself now and never compromise on
it. You'll thank yourself later.

Personally, I wouldn't compromise on any of these points for more than a year
or two. You may get ahead in one aspect, only to set yourself back in another.

So don't be afraid to slow down. Burning out and getting in over your head
will make your life miserable and difficult, but one extra year of school can
make the next twenty years of your life that much easier.

------
gte910h
Honestly, diet and exercise help a lot with that.

AEB. Always Eat Breakfast. I don't care if you have lunch in 2 hours. I don't
care if you're going to be late to class. I don't care if you're X. Always Eat
Breakfast. I don't care if you have to eat breakfast, then throw away 90% of
your lunch. ALWAYS eat it.

\--

On the other stuff you can do: Make being prepared into a project. I like
going over all the materials, identifying all the techniques I'd have to
master (in outline format usually, but some materials are bad, so I reorganize
it), then figuring out a way to determine if I can perform the techniques.

\--

Lastly: Are you sure all the lectures are useful? I always found at least one
teacher in a courseload that size to be completely ineffective and it a much
better use of time learning the objectives elsewhere and reclaiming those
hours.

~~~
twomuchpizza
I'll throw my hat in the ring for Always Eat Breakfast. I've been doing it for
years and my metabolism definitely improved. I tell people that it doesn't
actually matter that much what you eat for breakfast, just do it (as in,
chocolate cake for breakfast is better than no breakfast).

------
ZackOfAllTrades
Most of my impressive stuff has come from being nice and treating everybody,
students, counselors, and business people like they are people too.

Example 1: Went and talked to my teachers a semester early. Set up an extra
credit project on a whim that let me data analysis on a Berkshire Hathaway
company.

Example 2: After a failed business deal, I called up a vendor and explained
what happened and why we wouldn't be working with them. After the sales rep
heard what happened and heard that I didn't have anything to do this summer,
they offered me a cool internship working on a way better project.

The basics for academics: <http://calnewport.com/blog/> The yellow and red
books were great. Haven't read the white book yet though.

------
ErrantX
My advice is probably going to be different from most others here: _don't
worry about it, enjoy yourself._

Unless you are really lucky, once you're out of university you will be in a
9-5 job for some significant time, with a few weeks a holiday each year. Now
is the time you can happily let your hair down a bit, if that's what will
serve you well.

Consider what you want from these few years. If the answer is superb marks and
academic achievement then the other answers are for you.

But an average degree (which doesn't always hold you back in the next stage!)
will serve then take this opportunity to explore other things (social or
academic). I spent my first year of university working like stink, much the
same way you suggest. I came within the top of the class, but damn I was
knackered and had barely made any new friends.

Second and third year slipped (I ended up with an average degree) because I
started hanging out with new people, skipped the occasional class, did some
activities, joined societies, made my voice heard.

This wasn't just losing interest in the course, in that two year period I
changed _totally_ , losing a lot of my social awkwardness. I can pretty much
attribute my moderate successes today to the people I met at uni.

Anyone who plays down this aspect of being in university is badly wrong.

I think there is a balance. If you find yourself struggling to stay on top of
a project, or lacking motivation to listen in class... find something else to
do for the evening. Go to the cinema, go rock climbing, hang out with
interesting people. The problem probably comes from being "tuned in" to the
work constantly, so forget about it for an evening. University is as much
about developing as an individual and an adult as it is about the academic
work!

The good piece of advice already in this thread is _eat well_. That can make a
significant difference. Learn to cook properly; that can be an adequate
distraction in itself (see above).

Find a way to exercise, this is the one thing that will make you sleep a whole
lot better.

I also recommend finding a partner; obviously a good one. I found that
thinking about someone else (i.e. what they were up to, when I would see them,
anniversaries/events that I need to remember etc.) really helped. And it is
another person to remember stuff you forget :) (my GF in third year basically
saved my degree by reminding me that an essay was due in the next day...). It
is also good to have someone you can confide in, and someone who is close
enough to see when something is getting to you.

In general I'd suggest not bothering with special sleep or work cycles, drugs
or other extreme "hacks". Forcing yourself out of a natural cycle is often
risky.

Ultimately; if you're not having fun, change something. It is still early
enough that this is possible to do. It gets harder as the years pass.

~~~
smhelp
So could you share more details regarding how to shed off my social
awkwardness, and be more friendly. I made an attempt by reading "How to win
friends.." and well it didn't really help much, maybe I should have stuck out
longer, but yea I would be interested in your elaboration of this.

~~~
gte910h
Socializing is the process of learning the tricks, implicit or explicitly,
which people use to form bonds.

Basic tricks you can pick up from something like [http://www.amazon.com/How-
Talk-Anyone-Success-Relationships/...](http://www.amazon.com/How-Talk-Anyone-
Success-Relationships/dp/007141858X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1302732355&sr=8-1)

[http://www.amazon.com/How-Talk-People-Will-
Listen/dp/0801061...](http://www.amazon.com/How-Talk-People-Will-
Listen/dp/080106144X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1302732435&sr=8-1)

And DO IT ALL THE TIME. Talk to everyone. Talk to cashiers, talk to random
dorm people. Talk to professors. Talk to them like people. Be interested in
them, etc.

\---

As far as building friendships, the trick it to talk to people about
activities that might be interesting and plan to do those things. Then do
them. It might be as convoluted as a dinner + play + drinks evening out with
time tables and tickets, or it might just be a game of NHL hockey on the Xbox
360 later at 9pm.

\--

Women(or perhaps men, depending on sex/inclination): Just talk to them.
They're primarily people. Additionally, ask people out constantly if they're
interesting to you in that way. The 2nd time you see them or the 15th minute
of talking to them should be about when you think to do that. "Out" implies an
activity, and little else. It could be disc golf, or walking around town even.
It's about talking.

\---

For any social situation: Read a bit about the news, and a couple obscure (non
tech, not all political, but some is okay) sources. Talk with people about
them. Figure out how to ask questions about what people think about the
happenings of the world which someone could have an opinion on without having
read the item in question. This is a _great_ way to make sure you're not
totally out there and silent.

------
unignorant
You might question whether focusing on grades is the best way to really "get
something" out of university. I've benefitted a lot from my time in undergrad,
but mainly thorough what I've learned working on CS research with a professor,
or the time I've spent hacking on startups/projects.

That said, I can understand the drive to do well in class. I've done pretty
well myself, despite my nonchalance. I also share your aversion to studying
(generally speaking, I don't "study"). My advice then, if you want good
grades, is first to take seriously any problem sets you are assigned, and
second to go to class. At least in my case, the rest seems to take care of
itself, studying or no studying.

------
ajr1810
1) Eat well - this is paramount 2) Sleep well - again paramount 3) Attend
class - unless you are extremely adept at absorbing information very very
quickly. You must go to class at least and find a work pattern that suits you!
4) Pick 2-3 things and focus on them over the 3 years

My own example is I had 12 hour a week lessons, worked in the media from
7am-12pm (all my classes were after mid day) and then i'd go to class do a
couple hours in the library then evenings free to date, play sports or pick up
other hobbies like attending conferences, lectures or just going out.

Good resources to read are 1) Study Hacks by CalNewport 2) Racing towards
Excellence by Jan Sramek 3) Anything by Stevepavlina.com

Hope that helps.

~~~
stupidhurts
1) Eat well - this is paramount

How?

~~~
movingtohawaii
Have you ever heard the phrase "garbage in garbage out"? You can't expect your
brain to function at full capacity if you've been eating mostly junk food.
Protein is great for providing energy for both the muscles and brain, but of
course you want lots of fruits and vegetables and some carbs as well. I've
found personally that consuming candy or other things high in sugar lead to
myself behaving more impulsively, usually leading to blowing off
schoolwork/procrastinating. I recommend that you experiment with slight tweaks
in your diet and really pay attention to how your mind and body feel and
function as a result.

------
fburnaby
Study with others. Preferably others who are motivated, but don't know quite
as much as you. You'll end up teaching them the material. This forces you to
explain the same concept five different ways (until you find a way to say it
that your friend actually understands it) and this forces you to make all
sorts of new connections.

It also gives you near-term motivation to stay on task -- your friends are
counting on you to focus.

------
mpg33
Personally i hardly ever learned much from lectures, mainly because i found it
hard to pay much attention...

I found i learned most when doing the actual assignments/studying

------
Shengster
To give some background, I'm a graduating senior at a top CS university in
California. In the past year I've managed to maintain a 3.8 GPA while taking 5
courses per quarter, but I would highly advise you (since you seem to be an
underclassman) to not take 6 to 7 classes a semester.

My reason for doing so was because of an outstanding job offer that I accepted
the year before that begins in June. Otherwise, I'd likely be staying one more
quarter to graduate and take a lighter course load.

Here are a few reasons why I don't think overloading yourself with classes is
a good idea:

1\. You wont learn as much.

What I've noticed from taking this many classes is that you have a lot less
time to devote to studying than many of your friends. Because I had to
prioritize my time, I would often skip supplementary reading that would really
have helped me understand the material we covered in class. In addition, I
rarely went to office hours (computational theory was an exception). I did
well in my exams because I studied what I thought was going to be on there,
but after the quarter ended I realized that all the supplemental reading I
could have done would have given me a lot more insight in the topics we
learned in class.

2\. You wont have any time to have fun.

You'll have to turn down a lot of offers to do fun stuff with others. Hack-a-
thons, parties, etc., are thrown out the window. You just wont have the time
to sacrifice to do these kinds of things. I studied approximately 40 to 50
hours a week on top of the time we spent in lecture and discussion. I didn't
have a job though (had to quit my on-campus research job to study).

3\. You'll have less time to complete projects and study (especially finals).

It becomes exceedingly difficult to keep up with projects and study for
midterms or finals (especially finals). Last quarter we had a 3 week long OS
project dealing with user-level threads. Because of my time constraints and
deadlines for other classes (designing a CPU for my computer architecture
course), I wasn't able really work on the OS project until 3 days before it
was due. I managed to complete it, but it really wasn't an enjoyable
experience due to the pressure. This was a common story for me all quarter.
YOU WILL ALWAYS FEEL BEHIND.

Don't take multiple project classes unless you're a better hacker than your
peers and can finish assignments significantly faster than others. I'd go
against astrofinch's advice and say that you should always start on
programming assignments as soon as possible.

4\. You'll burn yourself out.

By the end of the quarter, I really wanted to give up. My reward for designing
a 5 stage pipeline processor along with a dozen programming labs between my
other project classes was 5 finals within a week. I had to pull all nighters
that entire week AFTER pulling all nighters the previous week to finish my
quarter-end projects.

5\. You'll hurt your GPA if you don't know what you're doing.

I was extremely lucky to do well in my classes. If I messed up on my finals my
grades would have been extremely poor. Unless you really know what you're
doing, and you're confident you can be successful under this kind of pressure,
taking too many CS classes at once will make your GPA suffer.

6\. Your physical condition will suffer due to lack of exercise, sleep, and
stress.

I always felt better if I had time to exercise everyday, but oftentimes, I'd
skip out on my weekly routine, and I'd feel like crap throughout the week.
Unfortunately, I'd always be catching up on sleep so I never got a chance to
hit the gym.

In conclusion, the wise thing to do is to take less classes and do well in
them. Take the time to hang out with other students, go to office hours, and
read stuff that interests you from class. Unless you have a really good reason
for doing so, you shouldn't be subjecting yourself to 6 or 7 classes a
semester. You really have to be motivated.

------
zackattack
Steve Pavlina graduated in 3 semesters.

<http://www.stevepavlina.com/articles/do-it-now.htm>

Are you working out?

