It's the beginning of the first semester of school for 2014, and whether you're a high school or college student it's important to learn how you're going to balance your time effectively for the remainder of the year. During your first week of school (or syllabus week) you can get a feel for how academically challenging your courses will be. Time management is the most important tool you can have when attempting to balance academic life with a social life.

Because the set up of an academic day in college is extremely different from that of most typical high school's, I'm going to break down my advice into two sections: High School and College, of course.

High School

Toward the end of my high school career is when this balancing act became tough. All my regular homework on top of college applications and trying to balance work, and a boyfriend, and two separate groups of friends, was slowly killing me. The truth is no matter how fair you think you're being when you attempt to balance your life, there will always be someone who thinks you're not being fair.

I'm someone who hates disappointing people but I had to come to the realization that no matter how hard I tried to fit everyone and everything into a schedule, for some people that'll never be good enough. That made me realize that I had to do what was best for me, which meant that my academics were first priority.

I went to school, then to work, then I did my homework, and every weekend I decided what would make me the most happy and I did that. Spending all of your time trying to please others will only hurt yourself in the end.

College

In college you're going to have a lot more free time; more than you've probably ever had. And it will be incredibly tempting to just nap after you finish class at 10 in the morning; but you shouldn't do that. The time you have between classes during the day is the perfect time t work on assignments. I scheduled all of my class so that I would have at least an hour break after each class. This is more than enough time to grab some lunch, type your notes, or start/finish an assignment for your previous class.

If you have days where your last class ends at 10 or 11 in the morning, and you know you have assignments that you should be working on, stay on campus where it be in the library or a student center and work on it. Being in an environment of other students doing work will motivate you to do the same. And when you do get back to your room you won't have to worry about finishing that paper you should've done earlier and you can spend time with your friends.

Ultimately learning what you need to do to be successful in school in an efficient and timely manner is key to being able to balance academics and relationships (romantic or friendly.)

xoxo

AME

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