Volume 124 Issue 99
kansan.com
Friday, February 17, 2012
SCHOOL
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Time Management for Students
//MEGAN HINMAN
We know you're busy. Here's how to stay sane.
PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY TYLER BIERWIRTH
To help with the time management puzzle, Julie Morgenstern, author of Time Management from the Inside Out (Holt, 2004) created a strategy called The Four D's for when you didn't plan as well as you thought you did, and you need more time in the day.
DELETE: Proactively decide that you just don't need to do something. That doesn't mean skip your hygienic routine because you don't feel up to it. It means realize that there are more important things to do, and you just don't need to fix your hair and makeup today.
THE FOUR D'S
DELAY: Schedule your task for another time. It's not procrastination. It's guilt-free reorganization. You still need to clean your room. It can just wait until Saturday, when you have time to vacuum and pick up all those clothes off the floor.
DIMINISH: Come up with shortcuts that will allow you to still get the job done, but quicker. When you thought cleaning the kitchen would only take 20 minutes, but the fridge alone has taken 30, just leave it at that. That's the worst part anyway, right?
DELEGATE: Realize that you can't do it all, and ask someone to help. Make a deal with your roommates that you'll get the house ready for the party if they go to the store for last-minute supplies.
Her alarm goes off at 5:30 a.m. It's pitch-dark outside and she crawls out of bed to get her mind set and ready for the day. She's not a morning person, but she makes time in her busy schedule for this: Exercise. It's the only time she can fit in a workout, and she needs it to manage her stress from her daily tasks.
She is Libby Johnson, a senior from Lawrence and student body president, which probably makes her one of the busiest people on campus. But she knows all about how to manage a packed schedule. Her typical day consists of attending multiple meetings, responding to tons of email, talking with fellow senate members, and going to class. Though Johnson's schedule is unique, it's not hard to identify with her busy lifestyle.
ing time on. Take time to plan out how you're going to spend your time and also be flexible for changes."
"One of the most important things I've learned through being involved in college is learning how to balance different areas of your life and prioritize," Johnson says. "You have to think about what's important and make sure that those are the things you're spend-
But how do you plan?
Julie Morgenstern, author of "Time Management from the Inside Out," says one of the most important things you can do to manage your time well is to use a single, consistent planner. Whether that device is a smart phone app or a daily calendar, make sure that you record everything in the same place.
"Time management is a puzzle," Morgenstern says. It helps to be able to see it all in front of you. If you write your tasks in separate places, you may be unknowingly creating what Morgenstern calls a "blind spot," which is a missing piece of the time puzzle. It's important to look at everything in context and fit the puzzle pieces together. By being able to see your time plotted out in front of you, you change your perception of time from relative and qualitative into concrete and quantitative.
Hunter Hess, a senior from McPher
son, knows what it's like to have a busy schedule. This year, he was a winner of the Excellence in Community, Education and Leadership, or Ex.C.E.L., award, which is given out every year by Student Involvement and Leadership Center (SILC) and other campus organization representatives. Hess says that managing time can sometimes take the spontaneity out of things, but he plans so that he can have time for his friends, be successful in school and work, and keep up with the responsibilities that come with winning the Ex.C.E.L. award, like planning the Blueprints Leadership Conference.
"You can do all of these things, but you just have to plan a little more carefully. It may not be as spontaneous, and you have to exercise moderation and constraint, which is difficult in some cases," he says. "Just keep in mind what your priorities are."
Rueben Perez, director of, or SILC also recommends prioritizing your activities.
"You're here for an education and
that needs to always be your priority," he says, though he does see students putting their extracurricular activities before their schoolwork. "Sometimes you can 'major in involvement' and forget your academics."
The most successful students Perez has seen are the ones who manage academics, involvement, which could be anything from a being in an organization to having a job, and what he calls "self time," which includes time for exercising, eating healthy, having a significant other, or just relaxing.
"I've seen students balance that and do all that very well," he says. So, it can be done.
Johnson and Hess both say that having a busy schedule has actually helped them manage their time better. Involvement and activities on campus provide structure to an otherwise lazy day.
For additional help with your planning skills, the SILC offers time management workshops. Visit www.silc.ku.edu for more information.
A limited budget, a month of rehearsal and a cast and crew comprised completely of students could be a director's worst nightmare. For Jacci Lufkin, it was a dream come true.
"You get a minimal budget, a minimal set so that it's only about your acting and your directing," Lufkin said. "This is supposed to be about the students that you're directing and what you can get out of them as far as your acting ability."
This year Lukfin, a junior from Melbourne, Fla, was the one student selected by the University Theatre Department to direct a one-act play.
Lukin was excited about the chance to direct a project since opportunities for aspiring theater directors are often limited. But being in charge of the show isn't easy. Her first task was choosing a one-act play that could be successfully staged with the available
The length of the show also allowed Lukfin and her actors, Julie Miller, a senior from Hutchinson, and Alex Roschitz, a junior from Kansas City, Kan., to develop both the comedy and drama of the play. Roschitz said that being a part of a two person cast was something he had never done before, but it gave him an opportunity to explore his character and play off of Miller. Working with a student director instead of a professor or an outside director was also something new.
1930s New Orleans, the story focuses on a mother soliciting gossip from her son, who is struggling with a secret. Lukin was drawn to the one act play because of its emotional intensity, but also because it required little set design.
"It's so raw; it's so easy without anything else," Lufkin said. "You could do this in a park. You could do this in a stairwell."
"It's a totally different experience from anything I've had," Roschitz
After "Auto-da-fe," the recently formed group, Musical Theatre for Kansas, will perform a thirty-minute musical love story. Gil Perez-Abraham, a junior from Wichita, said the group members, like Lukfin, were excited to have a chance to show off skills that aren't always showcased in the theater department.
"It's so unique for a university to have this kind of opportunity for the students, just to have the group and the performance opportunities," Perez-Abraham said.
The second performance is tonight at 7:30 p.m. in the William Inge Memorial Theatre in Murphy Hall. Tickets are available on the University Theatre website.
personal. Decisions were never 'I'm right, you're wrong.'
Edited by Anna Allen
The tournament used prison ball rules, which differ slightly from regular dodgeball rules. If you are hit anywhere on the body, including your face or head, you're out. The ball is live until it touches a ceiling, a wall or floors. This means a ball is still live if it bounces off a player, which is different from normal dodgeball, where a ball is only live if it has not touched anything.
Student Union Activities hosted a dodgeball tournament that consisted of 10 teams, and each team had seven players with at least three women on the team. The tournament started out as double-elimination, which means a team must lose twice to be eliminated from the tournament. After half the teams were eliminated, the tournament switched to a round-robin format where all five teams played each other once. The teams with the two best records would face off in a best two out of three series.
When you're hit you go to "prison",
which is located on the opposing
DAKOTA STRANGE
SUA Spirit Coordinator
CRYPTOQUIPS 4
OPINION 9
SPORTS 12
SUDOKU 4
"Whether it's dodgeball or something else, we would like to see this continue to help student organizations who have smaller budgets."
CLASSIFIEDS 11
CROSSWORD 4
of prison ball rules is the "shame ball", which is larger than the rest of the balls. If a teammate catches the shame ball while he or she is in prison, two teammates can get out of prison.
SUA opened the tournament up to all students, but it was geared more toward student organizations. The winning team received $225, and second place winners received $150.
The Sports Management Club captured first place and the $225,
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Dakota Strange, spirit coordinator in SUA, was happy to see a student organization win first place. The tournament was originally exclusive for student organizations, but because of the lack of teams, SUA opened it up to all students.
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Strange said SUA held this tournament to benefit student organizations and to help with its budgets. He also hopes to make this an annual event.
"It was a good showing from student organizations, and we received a lot of positive feedback." Strange said. "We want to continue events like this in the future. Whether its dodgeball or something else, we would like to see this continue to help student organizations who have smaller budgets."
nament for the Boys and Girls Club," Marello said. "We are giving the kids free t-shirts, so the money will be put to good use."
— Edited by Corinne Westeman
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2012 The University Daily Kansan
Today's Weather
To learn about "Our Dangerous Universe" with Washburn astronomy professor Brian Thomas at 7:30 p.m. in Malotl Hall. Be careful out there.
Beautiful day with sunny skies and light winds between 5-10mph
9
Good day to wash the Trans Am.