Get Organized

Perhaps you are one of those gifted students who has always been able to get good grades without much planning or studying. Prepare for that to end.  College will demand that you have outstanding organizational skills and good study habits so you might as well start now. 

Develop a dependable time management system, using a planner or PDA, in which you track all of your assignments, tests and other commitments.  Log not only test dates and assignment due dates but log the times you want to dedicate to studying for them, working on the project and any incremental goals you want to set along the way.  Attempt to avoid last minute panics and scrambling to make a due date.  You will be pleased with the result.

Be cautious about over-committing to too many extracurricular activities.  Even your best intentions for managing your time, studying in advance and meeting deadlines can be thwarted by the fact that you just don’t have enough hours in the day.  Commit to the things you really value and enjoy but keep your academics at the top of your priority list.