Dear Readers,
It’s finals week and I know a lot of you are stressed and stuff about not totally failing everything and going home for break to parents who are like, “I can’t wait for you to be a doctor!” and you’re like, “hah hah, yeah..”
So, in the holiday spirit, I’ve decided to help you out and tell you exactly how to prepare for a final/survive finals week.
First:
Start a week in advance by getting addicted to coffee. Don’t like coffee? Too bad. This is finals. Sack up.
You can do this by drinking coffee unnecessarily and then staying up late and then needing coffee in the morning when you didn’t get enough sleep. Done. You are addicted. You may ask, “why do I need to be addicted to coffee during finals week? Don’t I not want to be addicted so that it will work better and I can actually use it?”
This kind of logic is false! It is way more important to be actually addicted so that when you inevitably whine about being tired and needing coffee, you won’t be lying and even if you are actually suffering, at least you aren’t a coffee-poser.
(also, everyone around you will think you have more to do and will then feel sorry for you and offer to bring you coffee at random moments of the day. Hell yeah.)
All of this talk about coffee brings me to my next point, coffee shops:
Second:
Study at cool coffee shops. It will make you feel more grown up and hipster and you can have coffee while you do it.
Also, when you run into people, you can make a big deal about it and be like, “Hey! Omg I know I have soooo much work to do! When’re you done?! Good to see you!!!! I hate finals, teehee, omg!” Then you will feel popular, even if everyone else in the shop scowls are you for making lotsa noise.
*sidenote: You CANNOT be picky about which shop you go to because they will all be so full you may just have to linger outside in the cold until you see someone walk out and then walk in being like, what good timing!
**other sidenote: even though coffee shops are hard to get seats in and encourage you to spend monies which is also kinda bad, and have music playing that can distract you, they are still better than the library for the following reasons:
1. During finals week, the library looks like a refugee camp, which is scary and smelly cuz ppl don’t shower. It’s gross.
2. You have to sneak coffee into the library and the last thing you want is for someone to be like, “hey, you can’t have that in here” cuz then their you’ll start crying or you’ll get all angry and be like, “don’t tell me what to do!” and they’ll say, “its against the rules,” and you’ll say, “fuck the rules!!!!” (or start crying) and they’ll ask you to leave and now you need to find a spot at a coffee shop.
3. Libraries have lotsa stairs to walk up.
4. Unruly and mean patrons don’t recognize its finals week and feel entitled to the library (which they live in) and can be more distracting than the 90s pop music in the Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf (or the Starbucks. Again, you can’t be picky about coffee shops).
5. Libraries are cold.
***final sidenote: You can’t always study at home cuz as soon as someone finishes their finals they are like, “wanna get food or go do something? Wanna watch Glee? Why are you so stressed?” And you will get at passive aggressive cuz outside you’re like, “I happy for you that you’re done” and inside you’re thinking, “I WILL SHOW YOU ‘DONE!’”
Third:
To Review Session or Not to Review Session
If you are majoring in Reading like I am, you’ll know that review sessions are actually just places for people to talk about how unfair the final is going to be and how it sucks that the TA can’t give us more specific information about what to expect. Sure, you can define terms or whatever, but try and ask a question, I dare you.
Ex:
Student: how long does the response to the identification passage have to be?
TA: as long as it needs to be.
Student: what does that mean
TA: say as much as you need to and then you will be done
Student: how much do I need to say
TA: depends on the scope of your argument
Student: what does scope mean?
See. This is a totally futile get together of angsty, cranky, hungry, tired, stressed, college kids who want their TAs and peers to tell them the answers to the unknowable, unwritten, top-secret final exam. This brings me to my next point.
Fourth:
Avoid that kid who wants to “study” but actually just knows you understand the material better than them and wants you to explain again.
Fifth:
Materials
Again, if you are a Reading major, make sure you have plenty of Blue Books. I always like to bring at least 8 to each final exam. That way, you have:
1 to write in.
1 to make you safe in case you have to cross everything out and totally start over cuz you didn’t read the instructions.
2 to give away to people you are friends with and actually wanna help
2 to give to people you don’t like but feel guilty b/c they saw you giving Blue Books to your friends
And 2 to sop up the coffee at your feet you accidently kick when you realize you only have 30 minutes left and haven’t started writing your 5th essay.
WARNING:
DO NOT write your name on your Blue Books until you start the final because some skeptical teachers have you pass them all to the front of the class and redistribute them and then you have to cross it out and it becomes aesthetically displeasing and the person that gets it can still see your name and is mad at you cuz their exam booklet is ugly now.
Also, do not forget lotsa pens and pencils. Your ink will run out. It just will. The finals Gods deliberately sit up in the sky and wait for you to be almost done with your in class essay and then are like:
Sixth:
Facebook.
Facebook.
Now, this is a touchy subject and I know there are a lot of varying viewpoints on how to go about fb during finals week. For me, I take the realist approach. That is, I don’t get all dramatic and post a status weeks in advance saying:
“Hey everyone! Finals are coming up so I’m going off of facebook but I’ll be back soon! Don’t worry!”
Also, all of these statuses suck b/c people comment like, “it’s okay! You can do it!” or “congratulations!”
And I want to vomit cuz I’m like:
And the Seventh and final piece of advice I’d like to give: DON’T SLEEP.
During finals week, you have less to do than you think, but you spend so much time stressing and whining that before you know it you actually are kinda behind in what you have to do. Therefore, you cannot sleep. However, there are lots of upsides to not sleeping:
1. You can post as your status: “Been up all night. Ready for this final to be over!” and you will sound hardcore and like a college student. And then people can comment and be like, “me too!” and you have solidarity over fb with people
2. If you stay up, you are OBVIOUSLY more prepared than the person sitting next to you and when they ask “how much did you study for this final?” You can say, “Oh man, I stayed up all night.” And then they will be like:
You’ve totally destroyed their mental game! Good for you.
*note: if you are a Reading major, there is no curve, but you can still psych people out.
3. Sleeping is for noobs
4. Years from now, you can look back and be like, “oh those crazy college all-nighters.”
5. This will help you reinforce your coffee addiction and will make you even less likely to fall into “coffee-poser-dom.”
Hope this helps. Anything I should add? Let me know and Good luck to everyone who isn’t “done.”
To those who are, get off facebook.
Much Love,
Lisa January
