How hard is it balancing both a social life and a academic life in college?

<p>Just as the title ask, how hard is it? Im planning on going to get my MBA or head to law school after undergrad. Obviously grades are important in achieving that, but at the same time i don't want to waste my college years studying. So yeah how hard is it to get maintain a great gpa(3.7+) in college while having a good social life? My plan was pretty much on weekdays it's all about my classes and studying, then on the weekend, it's time to party uppp.
Any insight would be appreciated.</p>

<p>The GPA thing depends on your major and school, but in general if you stay focused during the week you'll have relatively little work to do over the weekend. In easy majors you may have no work to do most nights, and in harder majors you will have work every day, but not every hour of every day.</p>

<p>This completely depends. Freshman year is going to be easier most likely because its a lot of general courses. It also depends on your specific school.</p>

<p>I pretty easily got a 3.6 last year. I thought I was going to have to study a lot more than I did, and not procrastinate so much on papers, but that wasn't the case. I know one class I'm going to have to spend a lot of time on this semester is physics, so that will be different to last semester. :P</p>

<p>But honestly, I couldn't have studied all day during the week if I tried. There wouldn't be enough to study. I did a lot of my work on the weekends. Especially papers. Its just when I got my stuff done, usually kinda early in the morning, so I could be social during the day. I don't party really but found things to do at night so didn't work then either.</p>

<p>My social life I would say is good, better than I imagined anyway. i have quite a few good friends, and a couple very close ones. And I have time for a relationship.</p>

<p>Its easy to study too much, I think though. One kid I know studied all the time. He knew much more about chem than I ever would want to, he got better test grades, I studied a fraction of what he did, but we ended up with the same grade after curves and stuff. And i had more fun than him, and I highly doubt I will ever use most of my chem (aside from general concepts) ever again. ;P</p>

<p>I agree with S0ad. I maintained a 4.0, and still went out on both weekends and weekdays. I usually did my work on Sundays, when nobody really went out, and before dinner on weekdays.
It's very easily manageable with just academics and social life, but when you add EC's, a sport, and a job in the mix, that's where it gets tough...and this is my next semester, yahoo!</p>

<p>@ fendey516</p>

<p>It highly depends on how you prioritize your responsibilities and activities. If you know you are taking courses with a lot of reading, break it down into sections over days so that it wouldn't be cumbersome to do in one sitting. If you're in a course that involves problem sets or group projects, find a study buddy to help you. Don't wait until Sunday to do homework. You can do some work at your job or on Friday/Saturday to keep you on task.</p>

<p>Thank you everyone. But another question, how hard is managing college life with a job? Does it make it hard for you to have a social life? I don't need a job for college to survive, but the extra money i'd like to save up, so once im done with college i can move out instantly. Anyone here take a business major, and if so is it easy to get good grades?(not putting too much effort)</p>

<p>I can't answer that exactly yet, but I'm getting a job this semester, because I want to transfer out of state and need to be making some money.</p>

<p>I didn't get a job last year because I wasn't sure if I can handle it, but I know that I can, so am getting one. A lot of times I found I had a lot of free time and none of my friends were around so I was bored.</p>

<p>So I'm getting a job on campus (I have work-study) and they're flexible so I can work an hour or two here and there. And with many of the jobs its easy to bring a book and get some work/reading done. And you also meet people on the job which I thinks helps your social situation.</p>

<p>^ Again I agree with S0ad. My job is a pretty simple on-campus one, about 10 hours per week, but is actually pretty good pay. I didn't have any last year because I wanted to get acquainted with college and all that. Plus, now that I have a decent group of friends, I can avoid the whole relationship-building part. </p>

<p>I am a business major, and I think its fairly easy to get good grades as long as your sensible and keep up with the work. Accounting was actually pretty easy for me, but it seemed to be hard to a LOT of people. For that class, do the work before class, and study a lot for the tests. That's actually good advice for any difficult class you may take. </p>

<p>You'll be fine, don't worry.</p>

<p>Interesting thread. To be honest, I'm quite worried about balancing both a social and academic life.</p>

<p>"waste my college years studying"</p>

<p>:(</p>

<p>It's easy. You're in class so much less than you were in high school, plus you're basically living, if not with your best friends, than with a bunch of people your age who you hopefully get along with.</p>