By Joe Bridgeman

There will come times when you find yourself overwhelmed by schoolwork. I am currently drowning in a papery sea of academics. You may find yourself in this situation for a number of reasons, like:

• A difficult or work-intensive major
• Poor time management
• One stupidly hard class that clogs up all your time
• A virtuous but inconvenient habit of taking tons of fun classes to fill up your semester to 18 hours because you just can’t stand leaving unfilled credit hour space in your schedule
• Some or all of the above (guilty as charged)

It can be tempting to give up at this point or pick up unhealthy sleep habits (like not sleeping), but I would instead suggest the following alternatives:

• Wake up early instead of going to sleep late; you’ll then be somewhat rested while you’re doing your work instead of writing an essay in gibberish sleep-English.
• Distribute test studying across an entire school week; you’ll spend less time a day studying (allowing for other school work), and you’ll remember more for your test.
• Be OK working/studying alone with your phone turned off; you will be much more focused.
• Allow yourself small five minute breaks each time you meet a benchmark.

Avoid doing the following:

• Pulling an all-nighter; this has been romanticized in college culture, but it is seriously the worst. If you even have just a few days of forward planning, you will never be given so much work that it must be accomplished in one sleepless night.
• Cramming for a test (guilty as charged, again).
• Skipping class to do work for another class; you’ll actually just be adding complications to your understanding of yet another class.

When it all comes down to it, remember that even if you have the most terrible week ever: you always have the weekend to curl up in a ball under your covers and never come out. Stay strong.