The minimal-effort way to a high GPA

Someone asked me yesterday about my study methods, and I thought I’d blog on it as a nice change from bitching about nursing school. (Collective cheer from the blogosphere!) I navigated a BA at a large state school with a 4.0 and am in semester 3 of a BSN program still with a 4.0, so there must be something to my plan. The following tips apply more specifically to nursing school, though. So here is the plan.

1.  Go to class (every day) with your brain engaged. Do not confuse activity with productivity; IOW, don’t concentrate on writing everything down. Concentrate on what is being said, and write down stuff you don’t already know. Write it down in a way that you will be able to make sense of it later. Most importantly, do mental yoga while the instructor talks. No, NNR has not lost her mind with this instruction. Allow your mind to stretch and fold itself into pretzels. Wander a bit. “How does this connect to what I already know?” Make connections. This makes it easier to remember what is being said.
2. Look at all the assigned reading. If you already know the material, don’t read it again! If something is in bold, make sure you know it. If the level of detail goes way beyond your class, don’t waste your time. Learn the basics really well and move on (skim). Highlight the stuff that is vital. Then when you go back later, read only the highlighted parts. You can feel satisfied that you are reviewing the stuff you absolutely have to know.
3. Don’t read the study guide. Seriously. I have wasted my time with two study guides in my entire scholastic career and been burned for it. Learn the stuff from lecture and study the stuff you’ve highlighted. With that stuff, you can usually reason out anything else. If you concentrate on the study guide your focus will be artificially directed and restricted. Not only that, and more importantly, if you write reams of paper in answer to your study guide, you are WASTING YOUR TIME. Why? You are confusing action with productivity, and you are playing possum. Yes, you are. If you are diligently writing answers to your study guide, your brain is not engaged. You don’t have time for this in nursing school. Take the pain: sit down and actually shove the material into your brain. Do it once. Move on. Don’t tap dance around it and never actually do it because you’re creating distractions for yourself.
4. Don’t do study groups. Seriously. I’m not even kidding. This is the biggest waste of time ever invented, especially for nursing students. People sit around trying to figure out what questions are going to be on the exam and stuff like that. It’s more playing possum. Sit down with your book, notes, and brain (your own!) and reason out the material. If you have questions, THEN call someone (preferably your teacher).

Yeah, it’s not a guarantee. I’m about to get myself a crop of B’s this semester (partially because they changed the grading scale and partially because in some situations, the amount of effort and bullshit required to move from an A to a B is an exponential difference and simply not worth it to me). However, I spend a lot less time than almost everyone else and get a lot better grades almost every single time. This is a very workable system for folks who want maximum payoff for minimum effort, which is my goal in life for everything I do.

I have been sick this week, although not as sick as almost everyone else I work with has been. Still. I slept 12 hours last night and feel like wet Kleenex. The hospital called with the expected desperate plea for me to come in, and I feel hideously guilty for not going in, but my entire body aches and I seriously need a break, not to mention that I have giant piles of catch-up busywork to plow through for school.

Still lovin’ those Crocs.