How to Balance Schoolwork with Your College Social Life

College isn’t all about the classes. A college campus is the best place for young adults to meet, and similarly minded individuals can quickly become lifelong friends. Spending all day studying with the door closed is a great way to miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Classes are, however, very important. Doing poorly will hurt your GPA and your chances of getting a competitive job once you graduate. The balance between social life and studying can be tough to get right. To help you, here are three things to consider before locking yourself in for the night.

3 Tips on Managing Your Social Life and Schoolwork

1. Bad Grades Last Forever

If you do poorly one semester you will need to live with the consequences of your decisions upon graduation. Employers will look at poor grades as a warning signal that you may not be able to sustain the effort necessary long-term projects. If you begin a semester on a bad foot, make sure to speak with the professor and visit office hours to avoid potential consequences down the road.

If you’re just entering college, however, you won’t need to worry about this nearly as much as your senior counterparts. Poor grades freshman year can easily be overshadowed by improvement in your later years of college. As long as you can show a steady rise in GPA, there isn’t much to worry about.

Seniors who show a dip in GPA, however, will be scrutinized more heavily and their job-readiness may be brought into question. If you are on scholarship you may also need to watch your grades more closely. Dipping below a 3.0 GPA and losing a scholarship can be painful mistake to make.

2. Avoiding Socializing All Together Will Lead To Stress and Poor Grades

You should work to make sure your grades stay up, but studying all the time and sacrificing time with friends is not the solution. Students on technical, science-based tracks often make this mistake and can sometimes spend too much time studying.

When you put socializing out of mind completely, you are only hurting yourself. Giving up emotional connections with others is stressful and this stress will make you perform worse on tests. If you have challenging classes make sure to put in the time you need to study but make sure to plan dinners with friends as well as social gatherings into your schedule.

3. Don’t Miss Class

This is the mistake that most college students make and regret making more than any other. Missing class is extremely detrimental to your understanding of class material and in the long run will only lead to more work.

This is not your teacher’s first time teaching their class. They have spent years making sure that the content they provide prepares students for the upcoming exams. Missing a class means that you will need to read the textbook on your own in order to catch up, and if you have a question nobody will be there to help you.

Often, professors give tips in class that are not in the textbook and extremely relevant on upcoming tests. Some professors take attendance and will dock you for every absence. Others will give a pop-quiz every now and then without warning and add a permanent zero into the grade book for students who weren’t present to return a copy.