<p>I'm going to be commuting to college this fall. I live about 10 miles away and I'll be using public transportation which consists of a train and a bus. The commute itself is 20-25 minutes each way roughly. </p>
<p>My school is a commuter school because it has no student housing but a very large percentage of students, mostly out of state and international students, live in apartments that are a three minute walk from campus, so they're basically quasi-dormitories I guess. </p>
<p>I wanted to craft a schedule that was "commuter friendly" and was wondering if anyone had any tips that would make my life easier come this fall since I know commuting brings its own variety of everyday stresses that resident students don't have to juggle. </p>
<p>Which are (generally) better for commuter students:</p>
<p>1) Back to back classes? Or (1 to 2 hour) spaces in between?
2) Stacking classes on three or two days? Or spreading them out throughout the week?
3) Getting classes out of the way in the morning? Or scheduling them towards the afternoon or evening?</p>
<p>As for the social aspect of college I don't really care too much about making meaningful friendships. I just want to be able to get good grades without any unnecessary hassles or headache. </p>
<p>If you’re not into friendships, then I actually would recommend the clumping them into 2-3 days route.
It’ll save you commuting time and distance (more important if you’re a car driver, but yeah)
You get nice break days in which you have plenty of time to both do the work for the next class session and get some rest or free time.
One con is all the work will often be due at the same time. Manage your time well and you won’t run into problems.</p>
<p>–Try to start your classes say around 10:00 AM so you get enough sleep and don’t have to waste your morning waiting for school to start. If you want evening classes, find some people to hang out with although social aspect isn’t too big of a thing.</p>
<p>I would recommend clumping them together as much as possible, as long as you’re able to handle a longer day. You’ll save time and money on the commute, and in my opinion, it’s easier to force yourself to get to class. If you only have one class that day but the commute is going to be 40-50 minutes total, then it’s really easy to convince yourself to just skip it. If you have 4-5 classes in one day, then you might be more likely to go (to at least some of them) and once you get on campus you can just stay there until all of your classes are done.</p>
<p>Whether you want to lean towards morning classes or afternoon classes, I would try to base that on whether you’re a morning person and/or when public transit is the most crowded. If you take early morning classes, you’ll have to wake up extra early to commute to campus (and you’ll want to work in time for the bus/train to be late, missing a connection, etc). If you’re not a morning person, that can be particularly rough, and running late in the morning could mean that you miss an exam or can’t turn in an assignment. But if you like waking up early anyway or don’t want to ride a crowded/bus train at the end of the day, then morning classes may work out better for you. Odds are though, you may not get much of a choice or you may find yourself with class all day, if you try to cluster your classes in the same 2-3 days.</p>
<p>Also try to talk to an advisor and see if they have any advice.
Like others say, it might be best to try to go against rush hour if possible. But you may not have much choice.</p>
<p>Also think if it is better for you to do work at home, or if having time at the library would be best. </p>
<p>If you didn’t have class a certain day, what woudl you do? Would you do homework at home? Work? Sleep in? Do you do better with a regular schedule?</p>