Top Five Things Colleges Look at in Undergraduate Applicants

College applications determine which school you'll attend for the next four years. Make sure that you're focusing on the most important parts. Photo courtesy of TheBlackHour.com. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.Even though most of our readers are probably in college already, here's an article for those who haven't quite gotten there yet. USAToday College published a list of the top five items that colleges look at when examining a student's college application. Though the list isn't anything unexpected, it's a good thing to think about as you're applying to colleges.

1. Grades - More important than SAT scores apparently, having good grades is the best way to get you noticed by colleges. If you're only an average student right now and you're looking at some higher caliber schools, you need to start pulling those grades up now. Even just one semester can improve your GPA and chances to get into the school of your choice.
2. SAT Scores - I seriously dislike that the SAT counts so much in college applications since some students (such as myself) simply don't test well on standardized tests. But SAT scores are ranked as the second most important item that colleges look at. If you test well, you're good to go. If you're like me and only test average at best, you're going to want to really bolster your application with good grades.
3. Personal Statement - This is when being a good writer comes in handy. Make every word you say matter. Put your personality in it. Get straight to the point. It's your first chance to really make a personable impression on the admissions office, so make sure you come off strong and memorable.
4. Extracirricular Activities - The thing to note about this is that being involved does not mean that you're involved with every organization that your school offers. It is much better to be truly invested in two or three activities or organizations than to spread yourself too thin. Being invested in an organization means that you will have time to dedicate to move up the ranking. In other words, instead of just being a member in 10 organizations, you can be the president of one organization, secretary of another, and board member of another.
5. Teacher Recommendations - Teachers are the people who know you best academically. They know exactly what you are capable of. Be judicious in who you choose to ask for your recommendations. You want to paint a picture of yourself that gets your best sides. Choose teachers to whom you have provided your best work.

What do you think of this list? Let us know in the comments!

[via USAToday College]

How to Start and Maintain Healthy Living Habits

These snacks are undoubtedly yummy, but probably not very good for you. Photo courtesy of Old Shoe Woman. Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.College is a great time to start up good healthy habits for your body. It's a time when you're defining what's important to you, and amongst the hustle and bustle of classes, extracirrucular activities, and your social life, sometimes it can really be hard to commit to a healthy lifestyle. However, with a few easy to follow tips from Daphne Oz, author of the bestseller The Dorm Room Diet, you can start living healthier and also maintain these habits throughout your college career.

The main problem that college students seem to have when it comes to exercising and keeping their body active is finding time to do so. Sometimes it is simply a matter of finding an hour or two to carve out of your day to dedicate to going to the gym. It doesn't come easy for extraordinarily busy students, and it usually requires a sacrifice of some sorts, whether it's getting up early or cutting back on your social life.

If you absolutely can't find time to work your body, Oz says that, "The most important thing to remember is that exercise does not need to take place in a gym. Even if it’s just a ten-minute break while you’re studying to run stairs, or going to a bathroom on a different floor, or walking your errands, getting more activity in your day will keep your metabolism running high."

Another problem that college kids seem to have a problem with is snacking. Freshman year, I snacked a lot. It was just relaxing to come back to my room, watching some TV, and eat my favorite snack (Goldfish are so yummy). However, snacking during the day is usually unnecessary and not healthy. If you can, try to resist. It makes a real difference in the way that your body feels. If you can't fight the urge to snack, Oz suggests that you take out all of the unhealthy snacks and replace them with things like hard fruits like apples and pears, cirtus fruits which give you an immune boost, soychips which will satisfy your salty-crunchy craving, and even small amounts of chocolate chips to give you a chocolate fix if you so desire.

If you find that you're snacking too much with your friends while watching TV or just chilling in someone's room, try just grabbing a bowl and put some of the snack in there. That way you're still eating with your friends but you're also controlling your snacking portion which is much better than eating straight out of the bag. When you eat out of the bag, it's harder to realize how much you're actually eating.

For more healthy living tips from Daphne Oz, read the full article here.

Are these realistic tips for you? How do you stay healthy in college? Let us know in the comments!

[via USAToday College]

Cure Stomach Aches with Natural Remedies

Presumably kitties get tummy aches too. Photo courtesy of Tiniest Tiger's . Licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Every once in awhile, whether it's due to stress or just something you ate last night, your stomach is going to give your problems. Having a stomach ache can distract you from just about everything you need to do, and can leave you wanting to do nothing except lie on your couch and stare at the wall. However, there are some really great, natural cures available to you if you don't have stomach ache medicine close by.

• Ginger or Ginger Ale - I get seasick very easily, and so on a boat ride this summer, I spent the majority of the ride back sipping on some ginger ale. Ginger has anti-inflamatory properties and helps aid in digestion. Fresh ginger or even ginger pills are best, but ginger ale is pretty tasty as well.
• Peppermint - You can put a few mint leaves and a cup of warm water to make some tea. If you don't care for tea (like me), you can just chew the mint leaves as well.
• Warm Lemon Water - Lemons are usually easier to get your hands on than fresh ginger or mint leaves, and work well to settle your stomach too.
• Heating Pad - Heat is apparently one of the best ways to soothe away stomach pains, so if warm liquid isn't helping you, try placing a heating pad on your stomach. If you don't have one, Shep wrote a wonderful article about how to make one yourself.

For more natural stomach cures, check out Wise Bread's full article here.

Have you ever used these stomach cures? How do you settle your stomach when it's hurting you? Let us know in the comments!

[via Wise Bread]

Chrome Extension Yellow Highlighter Pen Makes Sharing Article Passages Easier

It's a screencap of an article on Yellow Highlighter Pen highlighted using Yellow Hightlighter Pen. Inception.As you comb diligently through articles and papers when working on a research project, you will undoubtably come across a passage or a sentence that makes you pause, either because it confuses or intrigues you. If you wanted to ask your professor about the passage in question, but didn't want to simply copy and paste the quote into an email without the proper context, what would you do? Why, you would install the Chrome extension Yellow Highlighter Pen.

Yellow Highlighter Pen is an unobtrusive browser extension for Chrome that allows you to highlight a passage from an online article, and then provides you with a unique link to that article with the selected passage that you highlighted. It's a rather simply premise, but a very helpful one for students who are constantly sharing articles with professors and peers within their major. Just the other day while doing research for my communication thesis, an article that I was reading had a section that went along with the research that one of my friends was doing. Had I had this extension then, I could have sent her the article with only the section relevant to her research highlighted.

Additionally, this tool is great for sharing links through social media sites. Sometimes posting links on Twitter to long articles is great to prove a point, but 99% of people are not going to read the entire article. To get your point across with an article, highlight the particular sections of the article that you found appealing and then post it to Twitter.

What do you think of the Yellow Highlighter Pen? Do you find it a useful tool for students in sharing information more quickly? Let us know in the comments!

[via Lifehacker]

Dos and Don'ts of Working at a Coffee Shop

Make sure you follow the proper etiquette of coffee shop studying. Photo courtesy of Kevin McShane. Licensed under CC BY-2.0.When you're working on huge paper or studying for that insane midterm, sometimes you need to put yourself in a new environment in order to stimulate your brain cells. I usually go to the library for peace and quiet, but there is a growing trend of students venturing off campus to local coffee shops to do their work. This seems like a pretty good deal. You camp out at your favorite table, are close to delicious drinks, and get to escape campus for a little while.

This is all well and good, but Mashable brings up a good point-- if you're going to study in a coffee shop, you need to be aware of the proper etiquette of doing so. The last thing that you want is to be that horribly obnoxious person who everyone is throwing death glares. So brush up on the correct behavior and make sure that you're not an unwelcome guest at your favorite hang out.

Here are some things you should do:

• Buy a drink every hour and a half to two hours. A coffee shop is still a business even if you've found it a convenient study spot. If you're hogging up a table, you'd better be giving them business in return for taking up one of their tables.
• If it's lunch or dinner time, you should buy food. Again, don't be rude by taking up a table and not giving the coffee shop business.
• If you simply don't want to buy drinks, you should tip well.
• And this is the thing that I would like to stress: keep your stuff in a very compact space. It's really quite annoying to see someone using up a larger space than necessary, especially when it's busy.

And here are some things you should not do:

• Don't hog a table if the store is busy. If business starts to pick up, be a nice person and find another place to finish your work, especially if you're not eating or drinking anything at the moment. If you don't move, you might be asked by management to move, which is embarrassing and awkward.
• Don't have group meetings for projects at a coffee shop if they're going to last for a long time (over two hours) and be noisy. Those meetings need to be held on campus where you're not going to distract other patrons.
• Don't stay the entire day. It's not your personal office or desk. If you really don't want to go back to campus, relocate to another coffee shop.
• Don't hog a lot of bandwidth on the Wi-Fi. If you need more bandwidth, it's time to go back to campus.

More a more detailed list of things you should and shouldn't do while working at a coffee shop, check out Mashable's article here. For a more-to-the-point list, check out Lifehacker's take on the article, complete with reader comments who have added their own rules.

Create a Meal Library to Help You When You're Short on Time and Creativity

My mom's meatloaf is better than your mom's meatloaf. Photo courtesy of interpunct. Licensed under CC BY-2.0.When you start cooking for yourself after living for a couple of semesters on dorm food, it's as if heaven opened up and a chorus of angels is singing. You have freedom. You can cook whatever the freaking hell you want. You want a burger? Cook a burger! You want a gourmet quesadilla with cheese and chipotle sauce at 2:00 after you finished a term paper? You make that quesadilla! You want pancakes? For dinner? Cook pancakes and throw in some eggs for kicks.

It's a time to experiment the cooking skills you inherited, and it's pretty freaking awesome. However, after a few weeks of making every thing you can think of, you might realize that cooking actually requires a lot of planning ahead of time. Maybe you get out of class at 7:00 and you don't have time to think of some crazy awesome meal. Maybe you're in the middle of your hell week and you have no brain power to spend an hour making an elaborate dish.

The financial blog The Simple Dollar has a solution for on-the-go chefs-- come up with a meal library. In this library, there are several reasonably healthy and inexpensive meals that you can prepare easily. For instance, my meal library includes meatloaf, chicken tacos, Bisquik chicken thighs, spaghetti and meatballs, and tuna melts. If I'm absolutely beat and have no energy, I know that I can come home, put my brain on autopilot and make one of these easy meals.

Having a meal library is good for several reasons. Firstly, you'll actually have something to eat on those hellish days when your brain has quit working. Sure, you could just go out and grab something fast to eat, but that's usually going to be unhealthy and expensive. It's much better to prepare something yourself and have leftovers.

Secondly, if you know your meal library well enough, you know to pre-stock up on these items in bulk. This will save you time and money from always having to run to the grocery to get an ingredient that you need for a library meal. I always have a box of pasta, meatballs, and spaghetti sauce in my kitchen. 

Thirdly, by having several meals in this meal library, you won't be stuck with the same dish over and over again whenever you have no energy. Sometimes when I'm tired I just pick up an already cooked chicken and make some pasta. Sometimes I make a tuna melt (open faced tuna sandwich with melted cheese). By having choices, I ensure that I don't get tired of these backup plans.

To get your meal library started, think of three or four meals that you can prepare in under half an hour. If they run longer than that in preparation time, you're not going to want to actually make them when you're in a pinch for time. Make sure you know the exact way you like the meal so you're not stressed about if you need to add more of one ingredient or another.

Meal libraries can work great if you live with multiple roommates as well. If you can work out a system where certain nights out of the week, one roommate cook a large, rather easy meal, it can help everyone out during weeks where stress is running high.

Do you like the idea of a meal library? What meals would you put in your meal library? Let us know in the comments!

[via The Simple Dollar]

Financial Mistakes You Can Learn From

Do you know how to handle your money in college? Photo courtesy of espensorvik. Licensed under CC BY-2.0.Lifehacker recently posted an article listing the author's top five mistakes she made regarding money while she was in college. Hopefully most of you know not to open up five credit cards as soon as you get on campus, even if the companies offer you a free t-shirt and a water bottle, but in case you or your friends need a reminder of some very bad things to do with your money in college, here are some absolutely "do nots."

Don't Ignore Those Who Know Better

Your parents probably know a thing or two more about financials than you do. I'm not saying that you take after their financial views, but the first couple of years that you're in school, ask their advice. Which bank should you use? Which credit card should you apply for? What should you be using it for? As you get older and enter your junior or senior year, you'll start to form your own financial ideals and break off from your parents. But in the beginning, take your cues and advice from your parents.

If you find yourself unsure about your parents' advice, do some research and educate yourself. Read up on some financial literature and magazines. You'd be surprised at the amount of literature that's geared at the college demographic. Being independent and finding your own way is part of the college experience. It's just best to not rack up debt and make stupid financial decisions on the way.

Don't Be Stupid About Your Credit Card

I know, you've heard this a billion times, but there's a reason for it. Unlike in the past, avoiding credit cards altogether can actually do more damage to your financial situation. You have to build up credit in order to go on to bigger things, and that usually means using a credit card. However, you have to make sure that you're doing it in a smart way. Use your card for smaller things that you know you can pay off or for emergencies only. Don't just pay of the minimum on your credit card balances-- pay off all of it. When in doubt, don't buy it.

Don't Assume It Will Work Itself Out

If you do manage to get yourself into a tight spot, it's not just going to figure itself out without you doing anything about it. Get in the habit of budgeting your expenses so you don't end up spending 2/3 of your monthly income on clothes and have only a couple hundred bucks for rent and groceries for the next four weeks.

Creating a financial plan or at least thinking about your future goals will help you figure out your spending habits early on, and position you for success in the future.

For more financial tips for college students, check out the original article here.

What financial tips do you have for younger college students? Let us know in the comments!

[via Lifehacker]

How To Tackle Huge Projects With the Dash Method

Sometimes getting started on massive projects feels like this. Photo courtesy of danalipar. Licensed under CC BY-2.0.I don't know about y'all but this is the time of year where big projects, papers, and tests are already starting to creep up on me. It's far enough in the semester where we've learned enough material to be tested and apply our knowledge, but it's still not even October, and I'd like a few extra weeks to not think about these big projects. I'd much rather just push it to the back of my mind and deal with smaller, easier tasks.

However, that's not really an option. So if you're in the same position as me and need some help getting motivated to start working on those projects, here is a great method that you can try. Lifehacker calls this the dash method.

To start off, grab a timer and set it for ten minutes. You've got to start somewhere on your big project, so start with just ten minutes. That's not very long at all. You're essentially tricking yourself into getting started by limiting yourself to working for only ten minutes. When your timer goes off, congratulations! You've just stopped procrastinating and actually started. And here's something even better-- you get a break! Go walk around, get a drink of water, just something for a few minutes. Because next, you're going to do it again.

After you've done a couple of ten minute dashes, you'll start to realize, "Hey. I am actually getting some of this stuff done." And instead of wanting to go for only ten minutes, you'll find yourself on a roll. So now, adjust your timer to go for longer and longer dashes. The goal is to work yourself up to 30 to 60 minute dashes. It depends on your energy, attention span, and your own personal preferences.

According to Lifehacker, what you're doing is creating self-imposed deadlines. The deadlines in this case aren't to stress you out, but they're to help you make and create goals for yourself. This short time span to work on a specific project will keep you focused, and you'll be surprised about how much you can get done in those dashes.

Meeting your goals in the form of these dashes will further help you in finishing those huge projects because you're creating milestones for yourself. Every one you accomplish gets you towards your bigger finish line and the smaller sense of accomplishments will give you more and more motivation to keep going.

On your next big project, use the dash method to see if it can help you stop procrastinating and get on with it.

What do you do to help you stop procrastinating on big projects? Would you try the dash method?

[via Lifehacker]