Wait, How Many Courses?
If you're not already aware, the typical term at Dartmouth consists of three courses. However, for a variety of reasons, students sometimes either reduce or increase their workload to two or four courses. During your time at Dartmouth, you are allowed a maximum of three two-course terms and four four-course terms, but neither are required for most students. However, in my situation, it made a lot of sense to elect four courses this fall!
First, I need to quickly clarify some terminology. Students are only allowed to "elect" three courses—the fourth must be added during the college's "Add/Drop" period, which lasts for the first week of classes. There are a few more technicalities, but they're beyond the scope of this post. Here's a link to more information from Dartmouth's Undergraduate Deans Office website. My four courses are all (roughly) related, which will make this term super fun! I'm taking Italian 3, Latin 10.01 (The Landscapes of Latin Literature), Classics 6 (Introduction to Classical Archaeology), and Art History 11.01 (Art in Ancient Greece: Temples, Gods, and Heroes). Since I love Classics, art, language learning, and Reed Hall, I should have a great term!
But how do I plan to manage this increased academic workload, along with my job, research, clubs, social life, and mental and physical health? GOOGLE CALENDAR!!!
If you have ever met me, or even just sat behind me in one of my classes, you probably already know about my love for Google Calendar. Some of my friends have asked me how I use Google Calendar, and since I'll be leaning on it a lot during this busy term, I figured I'd share that information with everyone here!
Color-Coding
In my opinion, one of the most helpful features of Google Calendar is the ability to visually differentiate between your entries with color labels. Before each term, I assign a color to each of my classes and extracurricular activities so I can quickly see what types of events are on my schedule for the day.
As an added bonus of these color labels, Google Calendar has a cool feature called "Time Insights" that allows you to see what percentage of your day is dedicated to each. This is a great feature, because it allows you to physically check on your work-life balance and see how you are spending your time.
Schedule Meetings
It's no secret—Dartmouth students are incredibly busy, and getting a group of more than two or three people together in one room can sometimes feel like an uphill battle. To help make this challenge a bit easier, I like using Google Calendar's "Meet with…" feature. This little search box allows you to type in your friends' names and see what times they already have blocked off as "busy" on their calendars. Once you find a time that works for everyone, you can click to create an event and "Add guest," which sends them an email inviting them to add the event to their own calendar! This feature has made scheduling group projects, club meetings, and even just dinner with a large group of friends a million times easier.
My love for Google Calendar is a little bit embarrassing—I'll be the first to admit that. Nonetheless, life at Dartmouth is busy, and I wouldn't be nearly as organized as I am without it. I hope that these tips have helped you realize that managing four courses (or just a normal term) is easy with the right tools!