Despite what the recently turbulent weather may have you believe, the 2025-2026 academic year at the University of Connecticut is almost over. Last year, I capped off my freshman year with a retrospective on what I had learned and hoped to bring with me into fall 2025. This time around, I’ll be applying the same thought process to my sophomore year as we approach the end.
Pick and choose
Notably, college is the best time for trying things out. There is a seemingly infinite number of clubs here at UConn, and every single one is worth someone’s time, somewhere. As for what’s worth your time? Let me know when you figure it out, because I haven’t yet.
With classes, clubs, work and other obligations, your plate will fill incredibly fast. After you’ve done the work of finding your people in whatever organization you’re a part of, you might notice that your free time has suddenly vanished now that you’ve committed to your new groups. Unfortunately, it might be time to sort things out.
I’ve had my most success with organizing my obligations by ranking them in terms of what I’d pick first in the event there’s any conflict between them — this has mostly helped with events, as it means I’ll always know what to go to.
Find a way to get sleep
This might be the most obvious entry on my list. Sleep is hard to come by in college, especially if you’re committed to living in the moment. Most people are only here for four years, so it might be difficult to pass up on the more exciting opportunities, but unfortunately everyone needs sleep to live.
For most people, it might be best to just accept that eight hours of sleep is going to be a rare occurrence if you somehow haven’t already come to that realization. Despite that, I’m a huge proponent of finding just one day a week to get a full night’s sleep. I’ve been a fairly consistent “in bed around midnight, up at 7:45 a.m.” person, and when I don’t meet that standard, it usually means I’m up much later.
For the people who have hung out with me past midnight this semester, I thank you for your time and the memories, but I’m feeling the consequences now. 3 a.m. might be better off without me.
If you can find yourself one night a week where you can get a better night’s sleep, do it. You can’t run yourself ragged constantly, so find time to take a break.
Stay organized
I see myself as a fairly on-top-of-my-stuff student. While I’ve certainly had moments when I’ve turned in work just a few minutes before the deadline, this isn’t too often as to be uncomfortable. Unfortunately, I had a rude awakening when I completely missed the ball on an essay and skipped past the deadline entirely.
If anyone’s curious, I did turn it in last week — 15 days past due. I wish I could say I had learned something, but my professor gave me a 90, so I can only assume this will reinforce my own bad behavior.
I share this not to encourage submitting late assignments but rather to illustrate my point that you can be incredibly good at squeezing work in and keeping on top of stuff naturally, but if you don’t have a system set up to catch you when you fall, you’ll miss something eventually.
So for this lesson, I’d advise getting into the habit of writing everything down. Your own brain will fail you eventually, so start relying on calendars and notes instead. I’ve had bullet journals or sticky notes recommended to me, but right now I’ve been slowly integrating my calendar and notes into Notion. Maybe in a year I’ll have another article sharing whether or not this worked.
Find time for you
Everyone preaches the importance of self-care until they get busy with the things they care about. If you need to find a way to slow down every once in a while, I’d advise finding a hobby that you can do by yourself.
For me, this has been reading comics. Anyone who knows me knows I’ve developed a strong love for Batman in the past year, and I’d be remiss not to mention how it’s helped me relax. When your work is also your passion, it can be tough to close the laptop and turn your brain off for a few moments, but finding something to read without needing to engage every part of my brain has been incredibly beneficial.
If you’ve found your free time to be a little dull, maybe find something easy to engage with every once in a while. It might motivate you to slow down and relax.
This might be difficult during this time of year, but I do encourage anyone reading to find some time to put your work down. It’s nice to have a calming task to look forward to. But for now, remember you’ve got this, and good luck on finals!