<p>Spend more time preparing for college and less time preparing for college admissions.</p>
<p>Yea…procrastination stinks :l</p>
<p>Learn the system early. Like REALLY early. </p>
<p>Crack is whack </p>
<ol>
<li>Don’t start studying for ap exams 2-3 weeks before the tests! Especially if you’re taking more than one!!! Start in January or March!!! You don’t want to throw away $95 per test</li>
<li>Stop letting people walk all over you. Stand up for yourself and be assertive</li>
<li>Befriend people you would never think of hanging out with</li>
<li>It’s ok to not go to dances or parties. If you want to stay at home, stay at home</li>
</ol>
<p>I am still in high school, but this has worked for me all my life. For the first month of school, do so well that you get 100’s on EVERYTHING. Then, if you slip later on, the teacher will be extremely lenient. Trust me, I know from experience.</p>
<p>1.) Don’t look down on people, pay attention to your own stuff </p>
<p>I use to think negative about the people who wouldn’t have at least B’s and would be failing the class. But it turned out that it was none of my business whether they wanted to try or not, because they probably had something personal going on in their lives. Or they were just really, really struggling. No one is perfect. Neither am I. I learned my lesson when I didn’t get the grade I wanted and someone who I would always think less of got the grade. So yeah, things can come back and bite you.</p>
<p>2.) Don’t be too nice </p>
<p>Be polite, respectful, and courteous. But not super nice to people you haven’t known that well. Turns out if you apologize too much, say thank you a lot they will think they can take advantage of you. Don’t let yourself be taken advantage of. Show that you’re not weak.</p>
<p>3.) Sometimes the middle finger is the best weapon
For girls: if a guy is being a jerk you know what to do.
(This tip only applies if you’re being harassed)</p>
<p>4.) Try to have a good relationship with your teachers</p>
<p>I went through a lot my sophomore year. Everyday after school I would go to this one teacher I trusted and would talk about my problems with her. I even broke down in front of her once.
Also when you’re cool with your teachers sometimes they do favors for you. Like my ap world teacher would give me extension dates on some assignments B) or I would convince him to extend due dates for the class. He also had once given me credit on a late assignment (I had lost the paper and had to turn it in the next day) </p>
<p>5.) MAKE WISE CHOICES WITH PARTNER/GROUP ASSIGNMENTS</p>
<p>My biggest regret this year was getting into group assignments with a friend who didn’t do crap! It’s really too much to do all of the work… I even took my friend’s name out of the project before when I lost it and didn’t care if she was going to have an F. So yeah she got the zero :)</p>
<p>6.) Guys and girls are weird</p>
<p>Not going into detail. Just…be with someone who you also see as a friend? I don’t know how I can word this.
I know some of you will disagree with this but… Don’t go with someone who’s not part of your “status quo” it won’t work out because of the different people you hang out with. Things will be too awkward. Just stay friends.
Get over a heartbreak, you’ll meet someone new. And hopefully in college you won’t have to worry about the whole “status quo” thing. </p>
<p>7.) Don’t overthink/overanalyze </p>
<p>Just move on. Forget it. He doesn’t like you anymore. You got a bad grade, study next time. That person probably wasn’t even talking about you. If they were then maybe you’re just famous. Your serve wasn’t great oh well practice more. Why care too much, it only gets in the way and distracts you from what’s really important.</p>
<p>8.) Think about your health and family!</p>
<p>Get sleep, don’t stress yourself. Don’t worry your family. Spend time with them. Don’t skip thanksgiving because you wanted to study for a chem test 
(yes I did that) </p>
<p>9.) Do your own thing </p>
<p>10.) Have fun. Make time for a social life.</p>
<p>I took hard classes this year but I still managed to get out there. I made new friends as well :)</p>
<p>11.) don’t be scared
12.) don’t procrastinate
13.) don’t care about other people
14.) take care of yourself
15.) stand up for yourself
16.) don’t let a class take away your favorite elective, take some other class or try to work something out with your counselors/ teacher
17.) don’t start drama on the internet, especially publicly
18.) don’t post something you’ll regret
19.) be careful with the information you put online
20.) don’t bite your nails
21.) KEEP A PLANNER…
You’ll forget things.
22.) try out google drive, because it literally saves all your assignments even if your laptop/computer were to crash. Also you can continue working on your assignment at school in the library the period before it’s due without having to bring in a USB drive.
Drive has been a life saver for me.
23.) like everyone is saying, start the semester out strong </p>
<p>Yeah I know this was long my bad </p>
<ol>
<li><p>Start early in the system. I mean really early. The earlier you start, the less you’ll be struggling on later. I wish I had finished all my high school credits during middle school so badly.</p></li>
<li><p>Anything is possible. Anything. No matter how much the statistics are against you, you are the person who determines what reality you want.</p></li>
<li><p>Know what you want to do. Or at least make it so you can change your mind. If you are an average student, you are limited, but if you are the top of the class, not only can you be a rocket scientist, but you could just go out an be an artist in a cabin on a mountain. </p></li>
<li><p>Failures can be the best lessons you will ever receive. I learned more from the one class I failed than all of my dozens of straight A’s combined.</p></li>
<li><p>Be happy. Make plans. And make back up plans. One thing I like to do is write a “If everything goes to hell” plan. Makes bad times a lot less scary. Mine is to travel. </p></li>
<li><p>Do not procrastinate. DO NOT PROCRASTINATE!!! You will be feeling the pain later on.</p></li>
<li><p>Make sure to SLEEP, eat healthy, exercise and do not do drugs. This includes caffeine, energy drinks, ADHD pills and anything else you may think is safe. If you do, you will never be the same.</p></li>
<li><p>Explore all subjects, you may never find what hooks your heart.</p></li>
<li><p>Read constantly. Read a book at least once a week, preferably non-fiction. You will gain a lot more knowledge this way.</p></li>
<li><p>Write down all of your assignments. Stay organized.</p></li>
<li><p>Always expect the worst, because when the worst does happen, you do not want to be permanently knocked down by it.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>Get involved. Not necessarily for college but for yourself. I wish I could have realized all the wonderful opportunities I had earlier. Now I’m about to be a senior, and I’m realizing this all too late. But I still have a year! So it’s not TOO late.</p>
<p>Yea, I wish I did a few more fun clubs too :l</p>
<ol>
<li>Freshman year grades matter. Colleges want to see rigorous classes. If only I knew… I wouldn’t have taken CO math and science classes freshman year.</li>
<li>Join EC’s quickly, but only choose a few and commit to them rather than a bunch of random EC’s. Colleges want to see depth and passion, so do those few EC’s with passion, and you’ll be fine.</li>
<li>Don’t skimp on sleep, it’s crucial. I learnt that the hard way sophomore year. I nearly got really sick because of the insanely little hours of sleep I was getting. Rough year. Aim for around 7-8 hrs, with 6 being the minimum. </li>
<li>Spend the first week of school or so getting to really know your teachers i.e. how they grade. I good method I came up with sophomore year is to just go all try hard in all your classes, like put 150% in during the first two weeks or so to see how harshly the teacher grades. From then, adjust your effort level / class accordingly. This idea literally saved my bio grade. </li>
<li>This goes hand-in-hand with 4, but try to get to know your teachers from other sources and know their grading style. You could talk to upperclassmen or through sites like rate my teacher.</li>
<li>Get on good terms with your teachers, you never know when you may need them to write you a recommendation letter.</li>
<li>DO NOT PROCRASTINATE. Easier said than done, this is the sole reason why many students are sleep-deprived. Don’t mull around on facebook or youtube. Get to work as soon as you get home. Study halls are a blessing from heaven if you have one-- use it wisely. Make a schedule and stick to it (ex. from 3:00 - 3:30, do math WS, from 3:40 - 4:40 write Chem lab, etc.). This way, you cannot procrastinate. Be sure to incorporate small breaks about every hour or so to avoid a burnout. </li>
</ol>