Student story: Overcoming time management obstacles to college
About this video
A student explains that juggling school, sports and college applications was hard. He set aside at least 30 minutes a day for applications, even during football playoffs and midterms, and despite distractions from his phone and social media, he finished a big October application two days early.
You'll be able to
- describe the 30-minutes-a-day strategy for college applications.
- explain why small, regular chunks of work help with big tasks.
- identify distractions and plan ways to manage them.
Key words
- Time management
- Planning how to use your time so you get important things done.
- Midterms
- Exams in the middle of a school term.
- Nibble away
- Work on something a small piece at a time.
- Dedicated
- Committed and willing to keep working at something.
Transcript
- So a big obstacle for me during my college application process was managing my time. You know, with school, it's very hard to manage it with sports, but add college applications to that pile, and it's going to be very difficult. So for me, what I focused on was taking at least 30 minutes out of my day to focus on my college applications.
For instance, I had a big application due in October, and it was a big time for me for school and sports. It was playoffs for football, and it was mid-terms for school. So I had to focus at least 30 minutes on my college applications, and I began to nibble away at finishing them, and two days before, I was done.
And I know for me, I was really distracted every single night with my iPad and my phone and stuff like that, because, you know, a Twitter update comes up, or something about my team, the Lakers, comes up, and I gotta go look at that. And it was difficult, but I was dedicated enough, and I was determined, and I eventually got the applications done in time, and I was a happy camper.
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