Your first semester of college is wrapping up. Maybe you haven’t done so well and you’re dreading the posting of grades. Let’s make a resolution to do better this coming spring semester. Here’s how.
Study Websites are a great thing. The better known ones are Cramster, SparkNotes, and Course Hero. They offer a variety of services for the cost of $9.95 a month and up, although you can find some for free.
If you are stuck on a problem in math or science or you just got back something you handed in and you find a problem marked wrong but don’t know why, study sites will provide step-by-step solutions to the problems. A site may have solutions to problems from as many as 200+ math and science college-level textbooks.
If you type in the name if your college and a course number, you can get copies of the previous semester’s exam for studying.
Many of these sites have student-submitted lecture notes, study guides, presentations, and lab results.
Some sites will provide real-time help with “experts,” students who do well in the subject areas and can tutor you.
And, some sites provide questions/answer forums that are monitored by people who know what they’re doing. It’s like having a study group on-line.
Of course, there are the less-savory sites that will provide essays or research papers, even tests, which just incite you to plagiarize. Remember, professors have software to detect plagiarism, and if you get caught you may well be suspended from school–with a loss of your tuition dollars! But, if you use study sites ethically to get legitimate help, find out what you’ve done wrong, or for extra practice, they are helpful and worthwhile. If you use them only for a grade for homework, when it comes to taking a test, you’ll probably fail.
