<p>Any tips? I know the old mantra of "work hard, study smart, go to class, read the book," etc. etc., but are there any specific tips that current U of M students could offer up on keeping that GPA afloat? I know college is a very different environment, and I'd hate to screw my stats early on because of it.</p>
<p>time management and effort when you study. i think it might be more important to be efficient in what you do rather than putting in long hours IF you are half assing everything. going to class and reading the book will vary from class to class and person to person. some classes the textbook material is very diff than lecture notes. and others the lecture slides are incomplete without going to lecture.</p>
<p>for GPA, if you will be a first year, i would suggest taking a manageable set of classes with maybe one or two of them on the difficult side to get the hang of things. if you start off with a good gpa first term, you’ll have confidence and hopefully have good habits. idk what kind of student you are but i’d recommend first years to gun for the high A/A+ so they don’t settle for lower grades than an A/A- if a class is hard. shoot for this: [College</a> of Literature, Science, and the Arts : Students](<a href=“http://www.lsa.umich.edu/umich/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=43e0d377a3ce9110VgnVCM1000005001010aRCRD]College”>http://www.lsa.umich.edu/umich/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=43e0d377a3ce9110VgnVCM1000005001010aRCRD)</p>
<p>i am a pansy so i usually dont take more than 1 or 2 hard classes a term. when i say hard its what others say is hard, not necessarily what I end up thinking is. for example i took econ101 and chem125 first semester (i had taken AP chem in high school and waived the credit). i found gchem lab to be by far the hardest class to get an A in so far even though i had a solid background in it, whereas econ101 was straightforward. my advisor warned me not to take econ or delay it to winter.</p>
<p>the lsa advisors (i’m not honors so i cant speak for taht) are under the assumption that everyone is equal at orientation and will **** up bigtime. if you have a 2400/4.0 they will probably say ochem/econ is hard and maybe take something else.its the safer assumption but you know yourself better than anyone. </p>
<p>find some student orgs meet people and have fun but do not get carried away with it.</p>
<p>don’t slack off right before an exam. Forget about everything and study that weekend, it’ll pay off.</p>
<p>I’m going to tell you how I got my 3.8 GPA this semester.</p>
<p>Study efficiently. Putting in long hours is great, but if half of them are spent on facebook then they don’t matter. Go to your lectures, read your selections, participate in discussion. Most importantly, keep up a social life. The first semester especially, you will be overwhelmed a time or two with 16 credits and 2 very difficult classes (which I had, and I recommend), and you need to relax every once in a while. Meeting people is a great way to do it, with or without alcohol.</p>
<p>Don’t be the stiff who stays in his room every weekend to get the 3.9, that .1 difference won’t matter if you have no social ability.</p>
<p>did u already see bearcats’ tips: <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063376943-post16.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063376943-post16.html</a></p>
<p>Don’t take Orgo unless you have to. (If you have to, it’s not that bad, but it’s still a pre-med weeder.)</p>
<p>Don’t retake things you’ve already taken. You won’t feel like studying ever, and you won’t do well even though you have already learned the material before.</p>
<p>In general, a big thing I learned in my first semester is that you need to be proactive about everything. You can’t ever expect that anything is going to just happen for you, academically or socially. There are FANTASTIC opportunities for your education, your professional future, your own personal development, and your social life but they won’t come to you-- you really have to make an effort to go out there and get those things yourself. It’s easy to forget that, and if you don’t both your gpa and you will flourish.</p>
<p>Get off to a good start in all of your classes! Do not ease your way into the semester and the first set of exams. They will come before you know it and the worse you do initially, the better you’ll have to do on later exams, which adds to the end of semester headache. The best way to build your confidence is to do well early, so if you need to treat that first set of exams like finals week in order to do well, by all means do so.</p>