December | 2014 | TRiOSSS_Bull

I just wanted to send out a quick Thank You to all the mentees for showing up at the Group Meetings, Workshops, On-Campus Events, getting involved on campus and with TRiO SSS, asking questions, talking with your peer mentor, utilizing the TRiO SSS Office, and for coming to the Celebration party. All the Peer Mentors thank you for your effort, commitment, and valuable time you spent with us, we really appreciated it. You helped make this program a success by attending the events planned as well as participating in them, we couldn’t have made this program (Fall Peer Mentor Program) a success without you. I also just wanted to let you know that we wish we could have had awards for all of you, but we would of ended up being at the celebration for hours as well as wasting plenty of paper which kills/hurts trees. Congratulations for those that did receive an award, if you didn’t get one just know that you are a superstar in our eyes regardless. Also thank you for a great Fall Semester, I hope the best for you in your upcoming semesters and classes! I hope to see you all throughout the spring semester and to see how you have been doing. 🙂

The roots of all goodness lie in the soil of appreciation for goodness.Dalai Lama

No duty is more urgent than that of returning thanks.James Allen

Let us rise up and be thankful, for if we didn’t learn a lot today, at least we learned a little, and if we didn’t learn a little, at least we didn’t get sick, and if we got sick, at least we didn’t die; so, let us all be thankful.Buddha

Give thanks for a little and you will find a lot.Hansa Proverb

As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them.John F. Kennedy

A thankful person is thankful under all circumstances. A complaining soul complains even if he lives in paradise.Baha’u’llah

Be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never, ever have enough.Oprah Winfrey

Some people grumble that roses have thorns; I am grateful that thorns have roses.Alphonse Karr

Yes I am afraid I have to use the F word, no not what you are thinking but (finals), I’m sorry… But it’s okay there are multiple tips and strategies you can use to help you before you take the dreaded tests.

To help lighten up the mood, Priscilla sent showed this to me and I got a good laugh or two from this, hopefully you will too! http://www.buzzfeed.com/lucyh3/exam-week-as-told-by-elf-147h

Found this lovely one online:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kaylayandoli/the-leslie-knope-guide-to-get-you-through-finals-cqn5

Here are some websites with tips or strategies for studying for your finals:

http://www.businessinsider.com/study-hacks-for-final-exams-2013-12

http://www.usnews.com/education/blogs/professors-guide/2010/12/10/top-15-hot-tips-for-finals

http://greatist.com/happiness/better-study-tips-test

http://news.fiu.edu/2013/12/8-study-tips-that-will-help-you-overcome-finals-week/70573

http://www.cengagebrain.com/blog/2012/10/top-10-study-tips-for-college-midterms-and-final-exams/

I hope they help!

I would also recommend listening to music but only music with no words so like classical music would be accepted, my personal favorite is Kenny G.

Try looking through your notes and textbook (and any presentations like powerpoints) for further help or explanation.

Look at the information for each of your finals each day for a little bit.

Take a break in between studying, don’t study too much, change up your location, don’t sit for too long either!

Use sticky notes, colorful pens, highlighters, agenda/planner, notebooks to your advantage.

Also look at Study Guides if provided.

Make flashcards, you can make an online flashcard through http://quizlet.com/!

Also attend any (if offered) review sessions in class, they will pay off!

Make study groups (and attend)!

Go to office hours, email your professor, ask questions.

Get tutoring from Academic Success Center or from TRiO SSS!

Know when your final exams are. Talk ASAP with teachers if they overlap http://www.usfsp.edu/records/academic-calendar/

Make sure you have a healthy diet (including eating breakfast). Get plenty of sleep! Bring pencils and erasers.

If you need a blue book, you can get that at the UFSP Barnes and Noble for $0.75 each. http://usfstpete.bncollege.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/Examination_Blue_Book/ProductDisplayparentCatId=40363&imageId=582368&level=&graphicId=A&categoryId=40475&catalogId=10001&langId=-1&storeId=15053&productId=400000020836&topCatId=40351 (your professor would tell you ahead of time if you need it.)

Make sure you don’t procrastinate for studying and that you remember when and where your final exams are! Don’t oversleep. Set alarms to make sure you get up in time! Bring an extra jacket as it may be cold, and have water if you need it, gum if it helps calm down your anxiety or stress, and make sure you have an extra pencil in case the first one breaks. 🙂

For some uplifting inspiration and motivation, here are some quotes:

https://www.pinterest.com/coloradostateu/final-exam-encouragement/

http://talentegg.ca/incubator/2012/07/04/students-motivation-quotes/

http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/50-motivational-quotes-that-will-put-your-motivation-on-overdrive.html

http://ipassthecpaexam.com/exam-quotes/

“If you hear a voice within you say ‘you cannot paint,’ then by all means paint, and that voice will be silenced.” –Vincent Van Gogh

“Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.” –Mark Twain

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.” –Winston Churchill

“Your time is limited, don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living the result of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinion drowned your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition, they somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.” –Steve Jobs

“When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us.” –Alexander Graham Bell

“Don’t say you don’t have enough time. You have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michaelangelo, Mother Teresea, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, and Albert Einstein.” –H. Jackson Brown Jr.

“Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.” –Thomas A. Edison

“If you don’t go after what you want, you’ll never have it. If you don’t ask, the answer is always no. If you don’t step forward, you’re always in the same place.” –Nora Roberts

“Believe in yourself and all that you are. Know that there is something inside you that is greater than any obstacle.” –Christian D. Larson

“There are far, far better things ahead than any we leave behind.” –C.S. Lewis

“If we did all the things we are capable of, we would astound ourselves.”–Thomas Edison

“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”–Wayne Gretzky

“Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”–Winston Churchill

“What lies behind us and what lies before us are tiny matters compared to what lies within us.”–Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Change your thoughts and you change your world.”–Norman Vincent Peale

“Your time is limited, don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma, which is living the result of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinion drowned your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition, they somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”–Steve Jobs

“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”–Maria Robinson

“Out of clutter, find Simplicity. From discord, find Harmony. In the middle of difficulty lies Opportunity.”–Albert Einstein

“Yesterday is not ours to recover, but tomorrow is ours to win or lose.”–Lyndon Johnson

“How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and the strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these.”–George Washington Carver

“If you can imagine it, you can achieve it; if you can dream it, you can become it.”–William Arthur Ward

“It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”– Aristotle

“Success is not the key to happiness. Happiness is the key to success. If you love what you are doing, you will be successful.”–Albert Schweitzer

“Wear your learning, like your watch, in a private pocket: and do not pull it out and strike it, merely to show that you have one.”–Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

“He who asks is a fool for five minutes, but he who does not ask remains a fool forever.”–Chinese Proverb

“Study while others are sleeping; work while others are loafing; prepare while others are playing; and dream while others are wishing.”–William Arthur Ward

“Books can be dangerous. The best ones should be labeled ‘This could change your life’.”–Helen Exley

“Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”–Aristotle

“If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a prevailing attitude.”–Charles R. Swindoll

“Desire is the key to motivation, but it’s determination and commitment to an unrelenting pursuit of your goal — a commitment to excellence — that will enable you to attain the success you seek.”–Mario Andretti

“The secret of joy in work is contained in one word – excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it.”–Pearl Buck

“The quality of a person’s life is in direct proportion to their commitment to excellence, regardless of their chosen field of endeavor.”–Vince Lombardi

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”–Winston Churchill

“Successful and unsuccessful people do not vary greatly in their abilities. They vary in their desires to reach their potential.”–John Maxwell