<p>I just finished my first year of college and brought in a less than stellar 3.145 with 30 hours of credit.</p>
<p>First semester I made a 3.245 and second semester I dropped to a 3.044.</p>
<p>Now I've done pretty well on most standardized tests; I made a 2170 on my SAT, although I was a slacker in high school and was somewhere around the 75th percentile of my graduating class. I want to go to law school post-grad. and took the LSAT this summer (wanted to get it out of the way asap) and made a 173; however, looking at the numbers to really have a shot at the top 6 law schools (specifically NYU, Columbia, and Chicago, since even with perfect 4.0s from here on out, Harvard/Yale/Stanford are a longshot), I need to make some serious changes to my study habits.</p>
<p>My first two semesters I went to my classes, studied for the tests, didn't party too much, but I wasn't putting in too much effort on a weekly basis to my classes. Now, obviously, I KNOW that the first part that has to change is just that; I need to be studying outside of class every day/week, but I want to go into this next semester in 4.0 (or as close as possible, which I would like to think is much higher than low 3's for me) with all the information possible on what I need to do differently. So if all the well-to-do college students on this forum could inform me of their various philosophies/practices related to studying in college, I would greatly appreciate it.</p>
<p>If you really got a 173 on the LSAT after your freshman year, you are probably one of the smartest people in the country and should be able to easily get a 4.0 without studying.</p>
<p>Well, I can promise you that I did indeed get that score after freshman year, and I can definitely promise you that the latter part of your post is not true either.</p>
Try removing all technology from your room for a week. You’d be surprised how much time you’d spend studying, because there’s literally nothing else to do at times.</p>
<p>asasushi, you are a classic high-IQ, low-GPA type. As counterintuitive as it sounds, your high IQ is getting in the way of your study habits. You grasp the material quickly, and thus spend less time memorizing. Even if you spend a lot of time studying, you spend more time reading and comprehending irrelevant, dense, esoteric readings than actually memorizing what you need to memorize, or going to office hours to beg for answers. When test time comes, you draw a blank on 1 out of 10 questions due to not expending enough energy memorizing, and space out on another one but still get partial credit. Boom. 85. Your high IQ also makes you aware of which things are a waste of time - while earning a strong GPA is important, the effort you expend to earn is it a complete waste of time because you don’t retain any of that which you memorize for tests. You only retain that which you allow yourself to process and reflect on, which is probably what you do for the 9.5 hours a week that you study - process, comprehend, reflect - this unholy trifecta is the folly of the high-IQ, low-GPA underachiever.</p>
<p>Hmm, That is definitely an interesting perspective and it certainly explains the gap between my GPA and standardized test scores. Hopefully, these Cal Newport readings and other conscious efforts I make over the next few weeks of summer help me get to the 4.0 range where I’d like to be for the rest of my college life.</p>
<p>This thread really hits close to home for me. I too, scored high SAT scores, while only getting a 3.2 in high school. My verbal IQ is in the top 1%. I really thought I was dumb for the first 16 years of my life, until I got tested for ADHD and was diagnosed. I mean, my grades were always average at best, so Its like I lived the life that the grades dictated to me. I’m not saying you have ADHD haha, I’m just offering my personal experience. I think that whistleblower’s explanation hit the nail on the head, and it really sounds similar to my time in school.</p>
<p>I think the issue with people like us is that so few can relate. Anyone can suggest a book, method, or what have you but what we really need is someone similar who has been there and can offer some personal experience. I mean look at the way transfers2010 reacted. People just don’t understand that class grades aren’t an accurate representation of intelligence.</p>
<p>Its funny that you said how you were looking at the stats for the top law schools, because I was just doing the same thing, thinking of how hard I need to try in college to get good grades.</p>
<p>c57l, I think you’ll find (or have already found) that the law school admissions process is one of the most friendly to people like us that score high on standardized tests but don’t always translate well to grades/GPA. Since law schools tend to weigh LSAT REALLY heavily in the admissions process, heading into my sophomore year, if I continue to coast on my current subpar GPA, I still stand a decent shot at a Top 14 Law School, without having to retake the LSAT (and this is an LSAT that I feel I ****ed up 2-3 points on too). Of course, no one wants to be in the top 1% of LSAT scorers and not aim for at least Top 6, so I am in no way content to coast on the 3.15-ish GPA, but it is good to know that with my chosen graduate school path, my standardized testing abilities give me some level of cushion if I just can’t break out of my current subpar grades.</p>
<p>Either way, I suppose you’re right that personal experience will be most helpful with this, but I’m at least hoping that maybe this Cal Newport book has some advice for people of our particular disposition; if he really is an authority on studying like he’s supposed to be, then he must have advice for different kinds of learners, I figure.</p>
<p>What a bunch of crap, whistleblower. There’s plenty of students who are smart (high IQ) and have a high GPA. They also “process, comprehend and reflect [on]” what they learn. These are not conflicting attributes.</p>
<p>Anyways, asa, I had the same issue in high school. I was a 3.2 GPA student with a 2290 SAT. Looking back, it was because I was lazy and didn’t know what it meant to sit on my ass (or walk around) and study. Concepts, problem sets, etc., Studying is a combination of thinking/processing the material by reading and occasional practice via problem solving. Personally, I learn much better by processing than practicing, but everyone has to find that balance. Most importantly is the consistency of studying. You want to know your stuff when you go to class. I always thought I should just learn it on the fly while in lecture because I could handle it. It’s not worth it–use lecture time to solidify your understanding of the slightly vaguer concepts.</p>
<p>Saying that you’re too intelligent to study effectively and get a high GPA is…well–typical of whistleblower to say. I turned it around in college and I get good grades now and my study habits haven’t died down for 3 years. Trust me, it’s very easy to do once you realize that when everyone studies 5x as much as you do they eventually surpass you.</p>
<p>Well, you sound like the type of person that I’d want advice from as to the specifics of your study habits in college with which you turned your grades around. I mean, obviously, not being lazy is probably most of what I need to do to make the change, but do you have anything more specific?</p>
<p>It’ll depend on your major and the type of courses you take. I’m accounting & comp sci so I don’t deal with much reading beyond the textbook. I’m sure an English major would have different objectives while studying than I do. </p>
<p>For me, it’s all about maintaining an assignment planner and adhering to it. I’m scatter-brained; I’ll go around looking for keys that I left in one room and a coat in another. It’s one thing to live that way, it’s another thing to study/work that way. </p>
<p>I don’t just write down assignments; everyone does that. I write down the reading I plan to get done each night. I make sure that I study for every little insignificant quiz. The grade on that quiz doesn’t even matter–the point is that I’m using that quiz as a study tool for understanding the material. And don’t study less for midterms/tests that are worth less than finals. Just because a test is worth less doesn’t mean the material covered is less important. Study for the sake of learning. Silly things like this work.</p>
<p>In high school, I would complete homework assignments because I had to and I’d do the actual studying later. That’s not only inefficient but it forces you to cram. Nowadays, even though there’s way less mandatory assignments, I use all of them as study tools. That means reading all the chapters relevant to the assignment beforehand. It also means doing the assignment without a book/other unnecessary tools in front of you. Treat all material as a mini test. Finish the programming code without looking in the sun java manual. etc., </p>
<p>If you can’t complete assignments without a book, then you haven’t learned the material. Re-read that material. Personally, reading carefully is FAR more useful to me than doing a bunch of random problems. Most of my studying is spent reading. Practice problems just make sure that I can apply the concepts effectively. I’ve found that most people in our situation spend most of their study time reading. That’s the way to go if you have a flexible problem-solving brain, because the solutions come naturally when you truly understand.</p>
<p>The problem for me was that I could get away with it. I could blow off assignments and then make up for it on tests. It works, but you’re only learning the main points instead of all the necessary intricacies. When you start taking classes that have multiple courses as pre-reqs, you’ll be glad you studied effectively in the other courses. I am.</p>
<p>Also, I’ve found I need to pause when reading a lot. Don’t just plow through the book to say you’re done. No one but you will ever know if it took you 20 min or 2 hours to read. There’s no bragging rights to finishing first. I find myself standing up and using a couple min to reflect every 15-20 min. </p>
<p>I guess this is because most of my college reading is technical. If you’re a science/math/business major this is especially true.</p>
<p>Really? That seems to be the wrong way to go about programming… I seriously doubt anyone has the entire Java API memorized. Yes, you should probably be able to use classes, etc. that you use a lot as if they are written on the back of your hand; but to endorse programming without any reference material whatsoever seems entirely unrealistic.</p>
<p>Thanks justtotalk, all of those sound like good tips. I’m definitely guilty of completing assignments and doing studying later, and of reading to get finished and other such mistakes, so let’s hope I can really turn it all around next semester.</p>
<p>^^^I’m not saying you should memorize every method call available in the java library. I’m saying that if you’re in an intro java class and you can’t construct one of those silly Fish games by creating classes, methods, new objects, and writing basic code then you don’t know what the hell you’re doing.</p>
<p>Obviously if you know that the Sun library has already created an efficient method and you want to implement it–then search for it. But only do that after you’re positive you could’ve written the code from scratch if asked to. If you don’t know how to create that method yourself then you really didn’t do anything. You’re basically bypassing the work at the expense of understanding. </p>
<p>OOP doesn’t mean let’s use other java programmer’s work to circumvent actually learning. Only use methods you understand–that’s my point. Otherwise, review the text before moving on.</p>