Andrew Roberts’ The Thinking Student’s Guide to college: 75 Tips for Getting a Better Education provided insights into how to get the best education out of the college experience. Roberts is an assistant professor at Northwestern University and a fellow at the Institute for Political Research, so his tips come from the standpoint of a college professor, and allows for us students to see how a professor would think about different types of students and situations. Many of Roberts Tips were very helpful, such as Tip 48: Ask for help or Tip 36: Choose a Major that you love, but the most helpful tip for me was Tip 46: Show the professor that you are working hard. In this tip Roberts describes how there is a difference between just working hard on assignments and showing your professor that you’re working hard, and how it will help the perception that your professor has of you as a student. When describing professors Roberts says, “They are not against you. In fact, if you give them a reason to reward you they probably will. So give them a reason to reward you.”[1] Professors give the students everything they will to succeed as long as the students put in the work. The best teacher I have ever had was my high school science teacher freshman, junior, and senior year, he taught me physics, chemistry, and environmental science. He would give us just enough help to get us to the brink of finding the answer, but he would leave enough room for us to have to work out the answers ourselves, and forced us to show him that we were working hard. Roberts also says that showing the professor your work ethic can have a direct effect on your grade in the class. Roberts says, “I have been in many situations where a student’s grade has rested on the borderline of an A and a B or a B and a C. The determining factor was often my perception of how much effort the student was putting into my class”[2] Many of my high school teachers told me that they had the same philosophy. Why would a teacher help a student whose grade is half a point away from going up if the student doesn’t listen during class or take notes, when they can help the student who goes to office hours regularly and visibly shows that they are putting in all their effort into the course?
Andrew Roberts covers almost all aspects of college academics with his tips, but I would add one more. Tip 76 should be about learning how to handle college level reading assignment. The first reading assignment I received at Trinity College was around 150 pages long and I was completely overwhelmed. In high school teachers will assign 20-30 pages due the next day, but since college classes rarely meet on daily basis the professors will assign more, and expect more from you. The reading load for most classes will be far too much to read the night before class, especially if you have other work to accomplish. You must learn to do break down the readings in more manageable size and read them over the two or three days in between the class. There will be classes you will take that you will be able to get away with not doing the reading, and just skimming the book and listening in class. There will come a time though when the professor calls and you for an answer from the reading, and you will not know the answer. There is no easier way to lose the professors respect and trust then showing him that you did not do the work he assigned, and as Roberts has already said things such as showing you did the reading factor in come grading time. There is another more important reason to manage your time so you can accomplish your readings. Many of the lessons the professor wants you to learn will come from the readings, so skipping the reading means your not learning what you should be and you’re cheating yourself out of a good education. One morning I woke to my roommate looking at his computer. I asked him what he was looking at and he said that the bill for the semester was released. He said the semester cost 27,000 dollars. He then looked at me and asked, “Have we really learned 27,000 dollars worth of information?” I was not sure and I couldn’t give a yes or no answer. I would like to think that I had learned as much as I possible could this semester, but I kept thinking about whether there was more that I could have done. So if you don’t find a way to do your reading then not only are you cheating yourself out of the education you deserve by getting into Trinity College, then you are also cheating you parents out of over 200,000 dollars over your four years in college.
[1] Andrew Roberts, The Thinking Student’s Guide to College: 75 Tips for Getting a Better Education (University Of Chicago Press, 2010). P.96
[2] ibid