Our Voice

OK, so midterms suck. We’ve all come to terms with this. But as much as they suck, they are also necessary, for most classes anyway.

Think about it, what better indication is there that you might want to drop that organic chemistry class and try again later than a test over a bunch of material that you are supposed to know at the midpoint of the semester?

In classes without midterms, you just kind of go along with it, thinking you’re fine, until those wonderful late-semester projects and final exams. And then, oops! You could have spent that hour and fifteen minutes each Monday and Wednesday sleeping, exercising, or just not wasting your time in a class you were going to fail anyway.

Another benefit of midterms is the help they offer in preparing for finals. With midterms, you can see how a professor tests, what type of material he puts on them, etc.

We realize that opinions about midterms are divided, mostly toward the negative side, and we’ve lost some of you already. But those of you still here are obviously the true scholars of GCSU and were willing to hear a devil’s advocate defense of the hated midterm. Now, some help to get through them.

Study. Early and often. This way, you won’t have to pull the always-popular all-nighter before the test, though we know you probably will anyway. Especially in sciences and maths, understanding early concepts is the only way to understand later ones. So, keep up with stuff along the way, instead of scrambling to learn two months’ worth of material in four hours.
Especially for you freshmen: caffeine rules. It just does. Whether you get it from coffee or Vault, you gotta get it. Welcome to college, where all-nighters don’t mean 2 a.m. anymore.

Make friends, or at least acquaintances, with your professors. They don’t hate you, and in fact, probably want to help you succeed in their classes. Any information you can get from them about their tests by talking to them one-on-one is an advantage you have over your classmates.

Most importantly, use your brain. You know, that thing that got you into GCSU in the first place (unless you are really, really good at sports). It’ll get you through some of those questions you weren’t ready for.

Good luck and thanks for reading.

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Oct 10 2008. Filed under Our Voice. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry