What are the primary skills that students who are prepared for college life have that others don't? Students who are most apt to succeed in a university environment, whether on campus or online, exhibit five common characteristics:
1. MATURITY
A student can only succeed once he or she realizes that the responsibility for an education falls solely on their shoulders. Without the basic maturity required to take control of one's own decisions, students can find themselves floundering in a world where no one else is there to make sure they get up in the morning, go to class, or turn in assignments. In college, there is no longer an authority figure looking over students' shoulders to ensure that they are staying on track or, conversely, there to ground them or send them to detention if they aren't. With maturity comes the strength to ignore the chorus of peers imploring one to skip class just this once or put down the textbook and go out to that Thursday night party. It also gives students the confidence they will need to feel comfortable talking to professors, deans, or staff who know the answers to vital questions.
2. ADAPTABILITY
For most students, the transition from high school to college is a major one that can be simultaneously thrilling and daunting. For the first couple of semesters, especially, students can feel like strangers in a very strange land. That's why the students who are the most prepared for this brave new world are those who have the capacity to adapt easily to new environments. This can mean easily making friends, asking questions, or being able to quickly recognize what one doesn't know. Most students, for example, can discern how well or poorly their high schools prepared them academically for the rigor of college-level work within the first few weeks of classes. The most adaptable, and therefore the most successful, students take this information and immediately begin trying to fill the gaps in knowledge or ability. For some, that means seeking out tutoring upon realizing that they are behind the curve in core subjects. For others, it's finding they lack experience in writing and then taking a seminar on writing research papers.
3. GENERAL ACADEMIC PREPAREDNESS
As much as we would like to think that all high schools' "college prep" programs adequately "prep" students for "college," this just isn't the case. Some high schools are simply more rigorous than others, and two students can walk onto the same college campus with the same high school GPAs and even the same SAT or ACT scores, and yet their first-semester work can reflect vastly disparate levels of academic preparedness. However, those students who come to campus underprepared can close that gap if they display (or learn) some or all of the other attributes common among successful students.
4. TIME MANAGEMENT
I've mentioned time management multiple times before on this blog, but I can't stress its importance enough. Some students come to campus straight from college preparatory programs that emphasize student initiative and independence; these students may have a great deal of experience managing their own time, and completing writing-intensive or long-term projects for which there is little day-by-day guidance. However, many students have not had these kinds of experiences, and even those who have can find themselves needing to become not just apprentices but masters of the craft of time management. College students need to learn how to successfully manage free time, and most college freshmen find themselves with more "free time" than ever before. I am not a mathematician, but even I know that the equation: more free time + assignments that may not be due until the end of the semester = PROCRASTINATION. Also, students often are not prepared for the amount of work they may have to do for a given assignment, and so they often give themselves far less time than they actually need to complete it.
5. ORGANIZATION AND STUDY SKILLS
This may seem like a no-brainer, but the students who come to college most prepared are almost always those who are the most organized. (Now, organized is in no way the same thing as "neat"- some of the most organized people I know have messy desks, but they all have a concrete system that works for them.) Organized students generally keep materials for a given class in the same place, have separate folders on their computers for different projects or courses, and work/study in a regimented fashion. For a paper, they keep checklists as well as a running knowledge of what they need to do first, second, third, etc. Organized students also find out what environments and times of day are best for them and plan their studying accordingly.
Students do not need to exhibit all five of these characteristics in order to be "prepared" for college life and work. I've seen students who are incredibly immature in certain ways yet are able to get work done efficiently and proficiently. I've seen others who are adaptable in some ways but not others, or who are academically very ready for college-level work if only they could find that darn syllabus they keep misplacing. As success coaches, we have strategies for helping students address their lack of preparedness in these areas, for the more that students learn to master these skills, the better positioned they will be for success in not just college…but life.
About the Author
More Content by Watermark Insights
