Making the grade: climb to greater academic heights in college with this advice on choosing courses, selecting a major, writing papers, and dealing with professors

Careers and Colleges, March-April, 2005 by Tracey Randinelli

Swarthmore College? One of the toughest liberal arts schools in the country? No sweat, thought Esther Zeledon. After all, the Miami resident graduated sixth in her class from Braddock High School, one of the largest secondary schools in the U.S. with more than 4,500 students. In high school, she took 10 AP courses and pulled mostly A's. She figured work at Swarthmore would be more of the same. "I thought college was going to be like high school: Do some homework, a test here and there," she says. "I thought I would be able to get straight A's."

It didn't take long for Zeledon to realize she wasn't in high school anymore. The environmental science major soon discovered the workload was staggering. "I got about one paper a week for English and one every other week for history, as well as 800 pages a week to read," she says. That did not include a five-hour chemistry lab and four hours of pre- and post-lab work, as well as stuff like eating and sleeping.

But the worst part, says 20-year-old Zeledon, was that despite long hours of studying, she couldn't manage to pull the top-notch grades that came so easily in high school. "It was so difficult to get an A," she says. "I didn't see that pretty letter my first year."

Zeledon's story isn't unique. Even the most successful high school students can find their academic world turned upside down at college. The problem: They haven't been prepared for the vast differences between high school and college academia.

"Students find that the strategies that served them in high school are not good enough for college," says Pat Grove, campus director of the Learning Resource Center at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey. "The volume and complexity of the material is so vastly different, and the expectations of the faculty are entirely different from the expectations of their high school teachers."

In high school, says Grove, students are required to memorize and recall information. But in college, professors expect students to truly analyze and understand concepts.

Colleges are just beginning to recognize that graduating high school students need more guidance to make the transition. Many schools now require freshmen to take orientation courses designed to teach them time management, communication dynamics, and other skills they need to be successful in the brand new world of college.

CHOOSING COURSES

In high school, choosing your courses is easy--most are requirements and very few are electives. At many colleges, however, it's a little more complicated. You get a course book that may contain several hundred pages of classes. Which classes you take, the times you take them, the days you take them--it's more or less all up to you.

It doesn't have to be overwhelming, though. You most likely will have an academic adviser to help you. "Your adviser is your university resource broker," says Elizabeth Teagan, director of the Advising Center at Texas Tech University in Lubbock. The college adviser is familiar with faculty, knows what's needed to fulfill requirements within the university and in your major, and he or she can spot problems that you are likely to miss.

* COMPLETE GEN-ED REQUIREMENTS EARLY. For many students, one of those problems is filling general education, or gen-ed, requirements. In order to graduate, many colleges require that you take a number of credits in liberal arts disciplines--English, math and science, a foreign language.

"Gen-ed courses teach a lot of skills that students will need in their other courses--working in groups, critical thinking, analysis," says Dave Meredith, director of enrollment management for the honors programs at the University of Cincinnati. It's important to balance your schedule with a required math or foreign language course.

Getting gen-ed requirements out of the way early can be beneficial, particularly to students who are still undecided about their major, adds Meredith. "If you can say, 'I'm wiping off my history requirement,' that can make you feel like you're progressing."

* PLAN A BALANCED SCHEDULE. Consider courses that are extra challenging and courses that require less effort. "You shouldn't take biology, calculus, physics, and chemistry together the first semester--that's ridiculous," says Rutgers University's Grove.

Robin Diana, associate director of the Center for Student Transition and Support at Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, suggests meeting with your adviser early in the course selection process. Take a look at the course sequence for your major with an eye toward the next four years, not just the coming semester. Then agree what courses you should be taking, says Diana, "so that four years down the road you don't realize you need two classes that are not being offered that semester."

* BE FLEXIBLE. At many universities, first-year students are the last to register. That means that many of the more popular classes and class times have already been filled. "Know that the days and times that you want will probably not be the days and times you get," says Diana. "Have a Plan A, a Plan B, and a Plan C ready to go."