Happy New Year! Your student advice columnists are back in 2019 with new and improved solutions to your questions and problems. You can write to them anonymously at mcsmrampage@gmail.com. Use the subject heading “I’m Asking XYZ”
Q: How do you eliminate negative energy in your life?
X Replies: Everyone encounters negative energy in their life. Something is bound to frustrate you and change your mood-that’s just life. But no worries, there are lots of ways you can eliminate negative energy in your life. One way I eliminate negative energy is by surrounding myself with positive people. Some negative people are unavoidable, but you can limit the time you spend with them. Try to not focus on people who are constantly uncaring and neglectful. They are the ones sucking all of your positive energy out of you. Another way is to clear all your negative thoughts. Don’t let the small things bother you. Don’t complain and judge or criticize others. You should learn how to love yourself more, and be more forgiving of yourself.
No one is perfect so don’t dwell on your mistakes or imperfections. If everything is jumbled up in your head, sit down and try writing everything out. Sometimes, it feels like you have a lot on your mind, but if you write it down, you will understand that it’s not that much and you can deal with it. Write every single word down. Don’t worry if your list is too short or too long. The goal is to transfer all your worries and negativity to an external object. After you have written down everything, get rid of that paper. Throw it away!
I hope these suggestions help in getting rid of all your negativity!
Q: How do you get teachers to like you?
Y Says: Often times, teachers just want to see you put effort into their class. They want to see that you’re engaged, and interested in what’s going on in the class. A few simple ways to do this are:
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Participate in class— If a teacher sees that you’re participating in class, they’ll see that you’re both interested in what you’re learning and that you’re understanding it. Most teachers want a student-based learning center and for that, they only need students to give them their undivided attention for just 45 minutes a day.
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Don’t come late to class—Teachers hate when students are late to their class. It shows that they’re not interested and that they don’t want to be there. And if students don’t care about being there, then why should teachers have to put their time and effort into being there as well? Their jobs revolve around ensuring that you get the best out of your education, and by coming late to their class, you are only harming yourself, so don’t do it!
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Do all your work — Teachers sometimes do tend to give a lot of work, but it’s all meant to help you out in the long run. They are not giving it to hurt you.
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Show extra effort— If a teacher offers tutorial sessions after school, go to those! Show them that you want to do well in their class, so that even if your grade isn’t looking so hot, they know that you’re doing your absolute best to help improve it. Showing effort really does go a long way in the eyes of a teacher because they don’t just want to see you blindly doing work, they want to see you understanding it, and willingly completing it.
Q: How can we deal with the stress of college supplements?
Z Responds: The college process in itself is bound to be stressful … what with the pile up of applications, supplements, essays, scholarships, and a mountain of other things that all factor into the big, scary process of our first step into adulthood. Now, it definitely will not be easy to cope with this stress, especially when we’re already dealing with the added pressure of school on top of entering college season, but don’t fret, I have some handy advice!
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- First and foremost, I know most seniors are now long done with the college application process and are now awaiting their acceptance letter, so a word of advice to my juniors (and even sophomores); START YOUR COMMON APPLICATION AS SOON AS IT COMES OUT! I cannot stress this enough, but if you wait until September to start your college apps, you’ll be stressed from the moment you begin! The CommonApp website opens in the beginning of August, so by then, it helps to have a rough idea of what schools you want to apply to. If you do this, you’ll be able to spend your last month of the summer looking through the supplement prompts and creating drafts or formulating ideas in your head about what you want to write. Any idea is better than no idea at all, and in doing this, you’ll have a head start on your application. On top of that, if you start your CommonApp early, you’ll be able to get the personal questions out of the way, leaving only the ones that you truly are not sure about left to fill out during the school year.
- Get a mentor. The college process, although it’s fairly manageable on your own, is also quite extensive so it would be much easier to have someone help pave the way for you so that there’s no room for errors. In addition, a mentor is always willing to proofread your essays and supplements to ensure that all your ideas are flowing, and your grammar is on point. They’ve already been through the college process, plus they know what colleges are looking for; so their help is the best kind of help that you can get. It’s even better if your mentor is someone who has come out college not too long ago because their process will have been almost exactly like ours is now.
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- Set aside all similar applications that you have to fill out and plan to fill them out on the same day. For example, FAFSA, TAP, and CSS are all similar applications regarding financial aid for college and they require having your tax forms at the ready. If you set a specific date to fill out these applications (ie. spend a weekend filling out these applications with aid from your parents, a mentor, or siblings), then you can knock them all out in one go without having to worry about them later on down the line. It’s easy to scatter the applications, but this will only make for a mad scramble and confusion later, so I highly suggest for you not to do this.
- Look at old applications to find inspiration for your supplements. Finding a topic to write about for a supplement isn’t always easy. Though the questions may all be repetitive, they may leave you stumped each time. Throughout my college process, I found it helpful to look back at old applications for programs that I had applied to that required a written application as well. Almost all supplements ask you a “Why here?” type of question and once you have a general idea of “Why college?,” then you can spice up your responses to say why that college in particular.
- Have a planner, set deadlines for yourself and live by them. It’s easy to set a deadline and say that you’ll follow it through … but then the day of the deadline comes and your task is either half-completed or completely blank. Trust me: been there, done that, wrote the book. But if you can manage to set an actual schedule that you live by, then it will help so much because then you can get things done gradually. And you don’t have to assign yourself big tasks to complete with each due date, but try to match each task to a logical time limit that you set for it. For example, filling out an application should have a one week long deadline, whereas completing a 250 word long supplement can have a month long deadline. Below, I have attached a link to a planner that helps keep track of which applications and other submissions material that colleges require. (http://static.usnews.com/documents/college/onlineplanner.pdf)
And one more important reminder: Applying to CUNYs is not bad at all! Many people think that they have to apply to private schools on top of CUNYs and that city or state universities aren’t all that great in comparison to private schools. CUNYs are actually a great way to be safe financially, and if you go to the right one, you can get a great education there, as well. CUNYs aren’t bad at all.