Surviving the Assessment Period

Descriptive transcript

Hello and welcome to the episode of the UTS Student Hacks podcast that might give you a ray of hope in the middle of this stressful assessment period.

As usual, you're joined by Rachel and Kelly and today, we will be sharing some insights into how you can survive the assessment period. Side note: if you are not aware, the final assessment dates have already been released, so make sure you have a look at them. If you have any issues with the timing of your exams, get in contact with AskUTS via email or phone. These details will be linked in the resources.

Surviving the assessment period is different for each one of us, but we’ll be talking about some of our routines and habits that get us through possibly the hardest times of the semester. Feel free to take inspiration from this and remember: just because something works for us doesn’t mean it will necessarily work for you. It’s all about experimenting and taking it slow.

What's self-care like for you, Kelly?

Self-care to me is not beating yourself up for not completing tasks you originally planned. It is a sign for you to slow down, to reorganise and regroup yourself. Just take a few minutes of your day to stand up to do some stretches, take a walk outside to soak up some sun, or even just get yourself some fruit for some good nutrients. These little steps can help reset your brain. Remember that it's okay to not be okay.

Mine is knowing when I've had enough. See, it's hard enough to get the ball rolling to start studying and preparing for the assessments. But funnily enough, I find that knowing when to stop is harder for me. It's either I give up too soon when I've barely written a hundred words for my five-page lab report, or too late when I've gotten to the point where I start mixing words of all the languages I know so that my paper could still make sense.

It takes a while to learn when you can actually stop and take a breather, but once you do, it feels really rewarding to just listen to your body, stop, and just watch a couple of episodes of your favourite TV show or go for a walk. When you go back to that assignment, trust me, you'll feel refreshed and ready to write even more.

To know when to stop, I usually pace myself. I don't put any timers on or anything like that. But once I stop understanding the content of the lecture or feel like I'm stuck on a section of an assignment, I take that as a sign to step away and give myself a break.

Rachel, I really feel the same. I tend to overwork myself and then end up in a slump. I've just started to notice signs when I should take a break from my work and take a break to regain my focus. It is extremely important to pace yourself so you are able to create and maintain habits of keeping up with lectures and tutorial work. Whenever I fall behind, it's quite difficult for me to get back on track. So I strive to, at the bare minimum, keep up to date with week-to-week tasks so I have some idea of where the subject is heading.

Our eating habits might change when we're put under pressure. I notice that I start snacking more and drinking less water. That's why I make sure to place a massive jug of water on my desk to remind me to stay hydrated. And instead of giving myself the option to reach into a random bag of chips while mindlessly doing uni work, I take five minutes out of my day to prep the snacks. I usually have nuts and some fruits. We actually have an episode titled "Our Favourite Student Meals". You can check that out for some inspo.

Just like what Rachel said, I'm going to stress again that it is really important to get your daily intake of nutrients and, most importantly, water. Refrain from ordering takeout and make your own meals with ingredients you enjoy eating. Eating a balanced diet does not need to be a pain. Adapt recipes to your taste. For more inspo, talk to your friends and family for their favourite meals to make. This can be a small side project you can work on to not only help come up with dishes to eat but to level up your cooking abilities.

Be sure to not neglect exercise. Even just five to ten minutes may drastically change your mood and re-energise yourself to finish the task. You can do exercises in an empty space in your living room, go to your nearest park or even around UTS like the Alumni Green if you're feeling adventurous.

You may have assessments due one after the other or you might have them more spread out. Whatever it is, if your marks happen to get released while you're in the middle of writing up another assignment, don't fret it. If it's a good mark, then use it as motivation to keep on going. But if your mark wasn't so good or what you hoped for, then aim to make it up with this assignment. You might feel sad and disappointed and these feelings are valid, but remember that dwelling on past disappointments makes it harder to study and focus on the present task. The time for reflection on past events is not now. If you get hooked into that story about not being good enough, it will take you to a place of intense anxiety, low confidence and procrastination.

We are now going to hear from U:PASS leaders Isabel, Angela, Joyce and Alice about their tips on surviving the assessment period. Take it away, Isabel.

So my name's Isabel and I'm a U:PASS leader in Physical Aspects of Nature. It's my first semester leading it generally, so it's been a bit of a learning curve, but I've learned a lot. I'm in my second year of doing a Biomedical Sciences degree.

How do you go about organising your time?

I basically just go through the same routine every day that I study. So I get up, have my coffee, because I love coffee, do a bit of morning study, have a break, do a little bit more study and then have lunch and then have like a proper break where I'm actually exercising. So it's basically, I don't really have a set schedule, I just like to do the same routine every day, and I think that routine really helps as well.

Having a set routine does make it easier as you do not need to think about how you are going to organise your time. Next question. We're always sitting on our chairs staring at a screen and it's quite tedious and leads to losing focus. What do you do to combat this?

I think, yeah, just stepping out and doing something active because sitting at a chair all day looking at your screen isn't very healthy, first of all, so you need those breaks. And I think once you get the blood flowing and everything from doing exercise or anything, it just helps you study better. So not to take like a long, long break, like two hours off, because that goes into a bit of procrastination, just having a mini break and just putting your mind into focus.

Thank you Isabel. Let's now meet Joyce and Angela.

So my name is Joyce and I'm currently studying the Bachelor of Accounting Cooperative Program. I'm actually a third and final year student. I'm a senior leader in U:PASS and I used to lead in business statistics.

I'm Angela. I'm a Bachelor of Business and a Bachelor of Creative Intelligence and Innovation. I'm also a fourth and final year student and I'm a current senior leader for the subject Accounting for Business Decision C.

We all prepare for the assessment period differently. What's your take on this? Do you have a routine that you like to follow?

So I like to be prepared earlier on before the assessment period, so I always try to get a semester timetable made up, laying out all the assessment due dates, because I like to be prepared early on, it saves the troubles to come. And also over the years, I've created some templates for reports and PowerPoints, so I can kind of just recycle them, keeping the same formats and the headings and the contents, and that kind of saves me time during the assessment period so I'm not scrambling to make my report.

Using a template sounds promising, and it might be actually something worth doing. But what do you do when you just can't focus anymore?

I think a little rejuvenating self-help for me is going to the kitchen and making tea or a drink. I've been really obsessed with herbal teas lately, so I've been buying an assortment of teas and trying them to see which one makes me feel the best based on what I'm studying. Another thing that really helps is just ranting to someone regarding your studies, someone who doesn't know what you're doing. If you just rant to them about what you're doing, it actually helps you get back on track because it gets you into that thinking mode, but it also helps you consolidate everything you've just studied.

Another thing I like to do is maybe change the scent in the room, so set on an oil diffuser or even light a candle. I know it's a bit cheesy, but I've been buying these candles that have really nice caramel flavours and scents and stuff, and so that just gets me more motivated to get back on track.

Candles, tea and everything in between, that really sounds like a dream plan. Now I feel like we should totally end this with good vibes. Do you have a last message that could give us a bit of moral support to get us through this period?

Lastly from me, I guess it's have a little bit of self-hope in yourself. You know yourself, and once you know your study habits and all that, have a little belief that you can get through this time. Everyone's gone through this, we all face these assessment periods, so you're not alone. Once you get through one, you can definitely get through the rest, so just keep soldiering on.

And definitely the last thing to end on a happy note is probably: it's not the end of the world. If you perhaps don't perform as well, don't try to kick yourself over it. Everything is a learning experience, so always consider what you can do next time or consider how much effort you put in rather than the marks, and what you could have done. Just think of what you can do next, rather than looking back on what you could have done yesterday, consider what you can do tomorrow.

Reiterating Joyce and Angela, don't be too hard on yourself and take it all in as a learning experience. Now we'll talk to Alice.

Hi everyone, my name is Alice. I'm currently in a Bachelor Degree of Engineering and a Bachelor Degree of Business, so it's a double degree. I'm currently a U:PASS leader for Mathematical Modelling 1, so you might find me around if you're a first year engineering student.

How do you keep yourself in a motivated mindset?

I don't restrict myself from procrastinating or anything. I don't just tell myself I have to turn off my phone or my computer or anything. I think I give myself that bit of freedom every now and then. Say if you work for half an hour, you get ten minutes of freedom and you can do whatever you want, whether that's playing games or talking to your friends or catching up on messages. Do that, because I think if you stress yourself too much for a long period of time, it's easy to burn out quite quickly.

Very nice. Any further tips to give our fellow listeners?

Don't be so hard on yourself. Just always put your mental health first, put yourself first, do whatever you need to do to take care of yourself. I think that's the main thing, because I think a lot of students, it's harder for them to work under pressure so they tend to burn out, so just take care of yourself first. If you need to go for a walk or if you need to just sit down and relax to read a book or take some time in the sun, do that.

Have snacks ready because that's brain food. If you have nuts around you, that will fuel you for a good few hours, has a lot of great nutrients and whatnot. So find snacks that you enjoy eating that are good for you, not just potato chips or anything. Always have them ready so when you're studying you can just munch on them. It gets my brain working and it fuels me essentially when I eat snacks while studying.

Thank you to all the U:PASS leaders for taking the time to be a part of this podcast.

Thanks for sticking to another episode of the UTS Student Hacks podcast on surviving the assessment period. We'll leave you with five tips.

Remember to eat and exercise regularly.

Have a routine which is consistent throughout the session.

If you have a take-home exam, make a template beforehand.

Take a tea break or even change your scenery.

And don't be too hard on yourself if you're not always on track.

Until our next podcast, it's okay to not be okay.