Tips for Students to succeed in Academics and Career

Dr. Udaya Kumar Susarla, Principal
MVSR Engineering College,
Nadergul, Hyderabad

Academic and Career Goals
Set your Academic Goal:

• To get a meritorious B. Tech Degree (First Class Distinction with 75% to 80%)

Set your Career Goals: 

• Be passionate in life and pursue any task passionately till you take it to its logical end.
• Pursue Masters Degree (M. Tech in India (GATE)/ MS abroad (GRE)/ MBA in India (CAT) / MBA abroad (GMAT)) after B. Tech (Too many B. Techs in the market; Nearly 10, 00, 000 students graduating every year).
• Job through Campus Placements / Off Campus
• Indian Engineering Services; Indian Civil Services; AP State Group Services

To achieve your Academic Goal
Attend and Participate in all Classes
Arrive on time, pay attention, and participate in class discussions and activities.

• Take notes, read the prescribed textbooks, submit all assignments and lab exercises. With a fixed academic schedule system, you miss valuable information if you skip a class session.
• Show outward interest during lectures (attentive expression and posture) to self-motivate internal interest. 
• Before lectures, each day of the morning, spend 10 to 15 minutes 
  • Review notes of the previous lecture 
  • Read course material pertaining to the current lecture so that you can anticipate the main ideas that the teacher will cover.
  • Main Ideas are indicated by
    • Verbal cues (pauses, tone of voice, repetitions, etc.)
    • Summaries (at beginning and end of class)
• Course handout materials, including lecture outlines, assignments and mid exams, are designed to help you organize and learn the material being presented in class. 
  • Make use of them as much as possible.
• Stick to a routine, effective and efficient study schedule. 
  • Study in a quiet environment. 
  • Develop strategies, study skills, and a network of support! 
  • Plan to spend a minimum of 2 hours studying outside class for each hour you spend in class. For example, if you attend 25 hours of class each week, plan for at least 50 hours outside class to study. 
  • Please review anything that you have listened / learnt within 24 hours.
• Monitor your progress. 
  • If you begin to fall behind, ask for help. 
  • Teachers are here to help you and want to see you succeed. 
  • Interact with your teachers in and outside class.
• Choose two study partners among your classmates whose residence is close to yours. 
  • If any of you must miss a class, the other will take notes and share them. 
  • Meet regularly with your study partners, compare notes and discuss concepts with them and quiz each other on reading material.
• Be Test Smart  
  • Don’t lose marks because of test-writing errors. Use strategies to tackle different types of tests (e.g. multiple-choice, descriptive, and viva-voce). 
  • Read instructions, budget time to answer questions; 
  • Do easier questions first, 
  • Less difficult questions next to build confidence. 
  • This will enable you to score good marks.
  • No matter how well you understand something, without practice one forgets. 
  • Before a test, recall information without looking at notes or textbooks. 
  • Do assignment questions again.
• Take responsibility for yourself. 
  • Motivate yourself to do well. 
  • Get counseling and do the work effectively and efficiently. 
• Enjoy spending time in College. 
  • Participate not only in your class work activities, but also in your professional society activities, which gives ample scope for you to develop
  • Organizational skills
  • Interpersonal skills
  • Leadership skills
  • Work hard and you will earn meritorious B. Tech degree. 
  • With a good college education, you will do well in your life after college as well.
• Take a study break of 5 to 10 minutes for every few hours. 
  • Do something different from what you’ve been doing (e.g. walk around if you’ve been sitting, and in a different area).
• Open your mind. 
  • You are going to meet lot of people who see the world much differently than you.
  • You’re going to hear a lot of ideas / perceptions, which you may not agree with. 
  • It’s an important part of the college experience that will teach you quite a bit. 
  • Keep an open mind, respect their views and try to understand even if you do not agree with them. 
• Take care of your health. 
  • Have good food habits.
  • Do regular exercise and be physically fit. 
  • If you have a regular exercise program, keep it up. 
  • If not, start walking, running, or some other aerobic exercise. 
• Be conscientious and honest in your efforts. 
• Be careful with spending money. 
  • Even if you’re lucky enough to have parents who can help you out financially, you need to learn to spend money frugally and wisely. 

To achieve your Career Goals
Give wide reading. 

• Read books other than coursework.
  • Keep spending a few hours per week improving your vocabulary, listening skills, writing skills, analytical and logical reasoning skills.
  • Read English literature, books on anthropology, history, etc.
  • Such reading enables you to converse with anyone for a reasonable length of time in the subject close to the other person’s heart.
  • It would also facilitate you to develop rapport with various people which would eventually come in handy for your professional career in future. 
  • Read News papers, magazines such as India Today, Business Today, Business India, Out Look, etc
  • Learn two or three new English words per day and construct sentences with these words and share them with your study partners.
  • Spend at least three to four hours per week in reading books on Logical Reasoning, Quantitative and Verbal Reasoning aptitude. 
  • Practice exercises on these.
  • These are needed to get through the written test conducted by various companies for campus placements and as well as for writing GRE, CAT, GMAT, etc.  

Participate in debate and group discussions. 

• To gain expertise in both these activities, keep viewing TV channels such as NDTV, CNN IBN, Times Now, etc and observe how the various people are participating in debates and discussions on various aspects of current affairs. Develop speaking skills by modulating your voice as much as possible.
• Remember that most of the successful people are / were great orators.
• Never miss an opportunity to view the program of Mr. Karan Thapar’s Devil’s Advocate which will sharpen your brain in the development of logic.   

Develop Passion. 

• Keep viewing TV channels such as Discovery Channel, National Geographic Channel, Animal Planet, History Channel, etc. 
  • The programs inspire you and provide you the information that you normally do not get the opportunity to see.
• Keenly observe and immerse yourself whenever you view programs on these channels.

Pursuing MS abroad

• If you are planning to go abroad to do MS, take your GRE in the last week of June following the third year of your B. Tech. ensures that you get about 6 weeks continuous time in summer to practice mock tests of GRE. 
• This also facilitates your preparation for the campus placements which normally would be held commencing from the second week of July of your final year. 
• Aptitude tests for campus placements are of similar pattern to those of GRE except for Logical Reasoning, which is not tested in GRE.
• This preparation also helps you to do well in CAT for MBA in India and GMAT to pursue MBA abroad.

 

Published date : 13 Jul 2012 06:28PM