by Ken Moody

Created on: October 20, 2008   Last Updated: October 25, 2008

Moving out of the house for the first time can be very intimidating for young college undergraduates. Students who were successful in high school seem to either flourish in their new environment, or deteriorate during their freshman year. These five fundamentals of student success are quite simple to follow (even if you were just an average student in high school) and will help avoid being a college drop out.

Go To Class

Going to class is probably the easiest way to succeed in college. Listening to some quirky professor in a giant lecture hall may seem insignificant, but it is the key to success. In class is where your professors will tell you about your tests, quizzes, homework, and other assignments. If you miss an important announcement, you may be unaware of changed dates or miss out on what will be covered on the upcoming exam. Some professors are also tricky about attendance. For instance, one professor I have likes to throw "pop quizzes" at us on random days. You don't have to know anything for the quiz, just write your name, school security number and date on a piece of paper, and turn it in. Giving up easy points like these is silly because you are essentially getting A's, but only getting credit for a B's. Keeping good attendance is valuable, even if you're half asleep.

Don't DrinkOr At Least Don't Get Drunk

While it is often thought that college is a time to get drunk and party, it is really a time to get a degree. I'm not saying don't have fun, by all means have fun (maybe even have a few drinks when you are of age), but just keep in mind that you aren't paying thousands of dollars in tuition to get drunk. Also getting drunk leads to hangovers, and everyone knows hangovers are no fun, especially if you have to get up at eight in the morning to go to Calculus. Learning derivatives and integrals isn't going to be any easier when it feels like John Goodman is tap dancing on your head.

Don't Procrastinate

Maybe your dad has told you the rhyme about procrastination, but you should still by now know that procrastination is never the right thing to do. Let's say it's Monday and you have a paper due on Friday. You decide it will only take you two days to write the paper so you should logically start Wednesday to complete the assignment. Now Wednesday comes, and your Calc teacher decides to have a test in two days. That writing assignment is going to suffer because you are trying to memorize Euler's method and the Taylor series, and conversely your test grade

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