As a disheveled on-and-off college super duper senior, a lot of people look up to me. I can not count the amount of times I have been asked for unsolicited advice during the social fests that are discussion sections. In order to spread the wisdom only experience and academic achievement can give, I have compiled a few life hacks for new and old students to use in the upcoming school year — things that will save you time and effort when it comes to meeting the academic expectations you have for yourself. First of all,

Pat yourself on the back

You are the future, do not forget that. Congratulations on taking your first step toward changing the world — and failing that, at least getting a job that will ensure you can pay off a credit card. Take a moment to remind yourself how far you’ve come. Once you’ve measured how far you’ve came, take a moment to

Be thankful to your parents

Augustus Caesar once said, “Gee, it sure is nice to have the divinely self-proclaimed Emperor as a father figure.” While only some of us can brag about having an adoptive family that directly gained wealth from imperial expansion, most of us are here because of the hard blue-to-white collar crime of our parents. A thankful mindset toward their labor can inspire you to

Work hard

One of the things that will move you fastest towards the right academic track is an ancient Mesopotamian concept known as hard work (phonetically: h-ahr-d w-uhr-k). This philosophical idea essentially believes ritualistic recitation of sacred texts and long sessions of meditation on the ideas within lead to higher level of knowledge and understanding. When applied to math and science however, I have found this philosophy to be of mixed effectiveness. In this case I have found it best to

Set low expectations

George W. Bush, everyone’s favorite president, once said, “I like to tell the C students, you too can be president.”

Low expectations can anchor you firmly in the gray, depressing realities of reality and leave you coldly comfortable with any tests you fail. Why does failure matter when you — probably — have another test in another class? A firm set of loose expectations leaves you better prepared for the worst, especially when you haven’t prepared at all. Even if low grades come from the next test, I’ve found it easiest to

Creatively use money and influence

If you have enough of your parent’s money to burn, I’ve got the hottest tip on campus for you. Leon Saddler Redfield is a UW professor who teaches in Michael Tyson Statistics Hall at UW. Given his relatively low status as a professor — and what I’ve seen of his apartment while following him home — he can’t be earning more than 30K a year. Given this and his relatively introverted nature, it would be easy to bribe him away and steal his identity. Once this is done, you have the influence to change your grade in his specific classes. It’s a bit of a one time thing and you would be stealing my emergency free A in a STEM class, but I’m here to give you the tips no one else would. This is really nice of me because

It’s everyone for themselves

Trust absolutely no one, every idea you have is probably up for sale on the deep web. At one point I suggested to my lab group that we should break up our work into four equal parts, ensuring equal workload. Imagine my surprise and disappointment when I saw another lab group creating and implementing the exact same system I had suggested. Though I loudly complained in lab to my TA, nothing was done about the flagrant stealing. This is why I think it’s best to

Cheat

John F Kennedy once said, “I’ve cheated death in the Pacific, I’ve cheated the electoral system in Illinois, I’ve even cheated on sobriety tests in the Oval Office. Today for the sake of America, I will cheat on this test here and on my wife in the bathroom later.” According to a poorly formatted list of greatest presidents my uncle shared on Facebook, Kennedy is the ninth best president we’ve ever had. Checkmate hard workers. Now, the best way to cheat is to

Surrender to your new AI overlords

I was going to generate my last 100 words with ChatGPT to demonstrate to you the effectiveness of ChatGPT but I don’t want to let down the tens of fans committed to the integrity of The Badger Herald’s banter section.

At the end of the day, if you got anything at all from this article, remember these three things as you begin or continue your college journey. Remain indoors, trust no one and doing anything will make it worse. Get off my lawn.