Community College May Be A Good First Option

Entering into college isn't an easy task but it is feasible for those who have this as a goal. In an ideal situation if you are college bound you have addressed the issues that need to be addressed during your high school career and have a good enough record under your belt to be accepted to the college or colleges of your selection. Unfortunately some students don't think about going to college until after high school is done, and if they failed to make the grade or didn't do well on or in some cases even take the SATs they may believe that their chances for getting into a good college have vanished.

If you failed to get it together during your stint in high school or made a late decision on attending college there is no need to fret. There are several things that you can still do in order to make yourself ready to attend the school of your choice in the coming year.

It all initiates with making application to your local community college. Most people don't think that community colleges are worth attending but in fact they supply numerous benefits for students who are late bloomers academically and for those that are in need of a stepping stone between high school and a fully accredited University. A community college can aid a student to attain everything they need to become eligible for a good quality school in about a year's time.

There are numerous benefits but one of the biggest benefits of attending a community college for a segment of your college career is the cost is so much less that you can save thousands of dollars just by doing a year or two of classes there before moving on to the University of your choice. It is for this reason that many students, even those that are prepared to enter college straight out of high school, are opting to attend a local community college. Not only do they find that they save money off their tuition but most also discover they can save more money by living at home and working locally while completing their first few semesters of college.

Why Social Work Continuing Education?

If you just started a job in the field of social work, continuing education might be the furthest consideration from your mind. Perhaps you do not even know why it is necessary for you to take the yearly courses that may be required by your job in order to keep your certification. Many people may not completely understand this field. To some individuals, the people in this field are the bad guys in a manner of speaking. It is true that they often have to carry out difficult tasks that others do not like.

If you are in this field and have not been in it for long, perhaps you are just getting to the point where you see the broad spectrum of knowledge that you are going to need to handle the cases you run into. At a nursing home, there might be questions of power of attorney with children and their parents. At hospitals there may be questions of the mental state of a patient and whether they should go home to their children. At schools, there may be a student who needs emotional counseling. There are so many scenarios that could possibly come up. You will not likely run into all of these unless you travel to various places for your job, but they are all options for areas where you can increase your knowledge for social work continuing education.

As the time draws near for you to look into getting in those required hours of social work continuing education for your job, you will want to consider a few things as you look at various institutions. Time will of course be a factor if you work a full-time job. Learning style is another consideration, and you will also want to consider the course topics available at the various locations.

You may not have time to attend courses at the actual college. It may be out of your comfort zone not to have a teacher right in front of you, but with new technology today it can be almost like they are. You can choose from webinars and online courses that will help you to have more flexibility in your schedule. You may even be able to take reading courses.

Your learning style should also be something that you take into consideration when pursuing social work continuing education. If you are not an auditory learner then you will definitely want to have a course where you can at least see the teacher on your computer as they teach. If you do well with just listening then you might do fine with some type of mp3 course.

Five Tips for Learning How to Study

Learning how to study effectively is always a challenge for students who are often overwhelmed and over-committed to school, work and extra-curricular activities. The following tips are some I learned as I struggled through my undergraduate studies. If I had known these things in high school, I'm sure I would have been a better student. By the time I reached graduate school, I was an expert. Follow these suggestions and take the fast track to success!

1.   Avoid being overwhelmed the last weeks of class by preparing all semester. Of course, the best practice is to stay current with your reading and assignments as they are given. Realistically, staying current doesn't always happen, especially if you have other more demanding classes that require your attention just to stay afloat. If this is the case, you will want to focus on Tip 2 more than ever.

2.  Spend quality time with your reading assignments. I used to tell my Introductory Psychology classes not to read a chapter word for word. The truth is, especially in Intro courses, the textbook chapters are long and arduous. Unless you're super-human, your reading attention span won't last past the first few pages. Your mind will start to wonder, and the time you spend will be non-productive. Instead, spend quality time with the chapters. Start by flipping through the pages. Look at the section titles to get a general understanding of the chapter content. Go to the end of the chapter and read the Summary or Review sections. You'll be amazed at how much you can get out of a chapter by following the steps described above. Once you have a pretty good idea of the chapter content, go back and take a more careful look. Go through the chapter section by section. Focus your reading around the words in bold print. These point to the key ideas in the chapter. Jot down some notes to help you remember these particular concepts. Be sure to include in your notes the page number on which the topic can be found for future reference. This is especially helpful if you're allowed to use your book or notes for the exam. If you spend 20-30 minutes of quality time with your reading, I guarantee you'll get more out of it than trying to read the entire chapter cover to cover.

3.   Don't cheat sleep. This tip is critical to good performance. Yes, we can push ourselves a little by staying up later than usual or getting up a little earlier, but the better you do at maintaining your regular sleep schedule, the happier and less stressed you'll be. Disrupting sleep patterns has serious consequences including insomnia. Once you've messed with your circadian rhythm, it's hard to get back to a normal sleep routine because your brain doesn't know when it's time to start shutting down. A common complaint from college students is that their brains won't shut off so they can go to sleep. Lack of sleep also triggers our stress response system, which means your body is being flooded with cortisol. Increased cortisol levels can cause insomnia so you can see it's a viscous cycle. The truth is, you can perform better when rested; therefore, you can complete the work in about half the time. If you study when you're rested, you'll not only be able to retain more information, you'll be a happier person to be around.

4.  Avoid cramming. Cramming for a test rarely produces a positive outcome. Here's the problem. Our brains can hold only a certain amount of information in short-term memory. When you cram for a test, you are literally trying to cram information into short-term memory, but your brain will only retain a limited amount of what you cram into it. I used to give this example to my students. Hold your hands together to form a cup shape. Now imagine you're putting information into this rather small container. Eventually, the container will get full. If you keep trying to put information in the container, some of the information you already put in will be forced to spill out. It works kind of like pouring too much tea into a teacup. How do you solve this problem? If you follow Tip 2 above, you will effectively transfer some of the information to long-term memory, which has a much larger capacity for retaining information. You can create large networks of information by tying the new information to something you already know. Figure out how to make it make sense and you won't forget it. Guaranteed!

5.   Factor down time into your schedule. Believe it or not, this act will help you be a better student. The truth is that our brains and bodies need down time to recover and rejuvenate. A rejuvenated brain will perform better than a brain that is drained and exhausted. The thought of down time might seem unrealistic when you're experiencing end-of-the-semester crunch time. Assignments, papers, and projects are due, and you have to get ready for the final exam. Down time doesn't have to be a long time. It just has to be time that you don't read, use the computer, or think about all the work you have ahead. Down time has to be quality time. It might include a walk around the block, 30 minutes of television, dinner with a friend, or relaxing meditation.