It feels like spring semester just started yesterday. Time has flown by, and the week most dreaded by college students is steadily approaching.

The week of throwing back shots of espresso like tequila shots at a pregame party. The week where you spend countless hours staring at books and lecture notes, wishing you hadn’t procrastinated all semester. Yes, I am talking about finals week! Are you ready to take on finals week stress free?

In the past, I’m pretty sure I was never ready for finals. I used to stay up all night, cramming in a bunch of bull and wondering how I would be able to pull it off.  A French test on Monday, a history exam on Tuesday, and so on. Like many other students, my stress levels were always through the roof during finals, and a lot of questions would run through my mind. Should I study this or that for the test? Should I study both? Will I be able to get the 3.8 I hoped for or will I totally bomb everything? It was enough to make you have a nervous breakdown! However, in the two years I have attended LSU, I have learned how to avoid the finals week hysteria and get through it without stressing.

One of the first things I learned to do was to get a head start in all of my classes. The reality is that most students wait until the last few weeks before finals to start studying. They spend the semester partying and, in the end, they get stuck having to cram a semester’s worth of work into their memory in only a few days. I had to learn to devote a set amount of time to each class a week. I studied just about every day. I found that this actually helped me in classes that required me to do time consuming things like reading books.

Get highlighters and sticky notes! They can be your best friends before and during finals week.  Use them to mark pages and highlight important notes so that it’s easier for you to review during finals. 

Avoid people who stress out easily at all costs! During my freshman year of college, I figured out rather quickly that I had to avoid people who were constantly stressed about finals. I noticed that whenever I would hang around or study with my friends who worried a lot, I would become very tense. It was like I took their stress on as my own. I would panic and let it get the best of me. Because stress is so contagious, it could be your worst nightmare during finals. Find a group of classmates or friends who have an optimistic outlook on finals to study with. Positivity, like stress, is also contagious.

Finals week is not the end of the world! Take a deep breath and focus on the grade you want to make. Don’t let negativity cause you to break down and question your ability to perform on a test.  As long as you study, there is no reason to stress!

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