Finals are upon us!

If you’re a freshman, congratulations on making it to the end of your first semester of college! We wish you all the best of luck on finals and a restful break–and a happy and healthy start to 2023!

Here are some tips for studying for finals and staying healthy and sane through the process.

On keeping sane… Ms. Tanzman recommends practicing mindfulness.

According to Jon Kabat-Zinn, “Mindfulness is awareness that arises through paying attention, on purpose, in the present moment, non-judgmentally” (www.mindful.org). As you may remember from our first-year colloquium class, incorporating mindfulness into your daily routine has many benefits.

It is recommended that you try different meditations in order to figure out which ones work best for you in different situations. It is also possible that you may find that you prefer only one or two meditations, but it is still encouraged to experiment with as many as you can. Koru Mindfulness has free guided meditations that students can access to practice mindfulness. The audio recordings can be found at: https://student.korumindfulness.org/free-guided-meditations.html.

It can be difficult during final time to focus on studying for long stretches. To facilitate this, students often consume large quantities of caffeine. This along with stress can then make it difficult for students to fall asleep in the evenings.

Instead of caffeine, try dynamic breathing for 1-2 minutes to help wake up and improve focus. While it may look embarrassing, students can usually do this in a bathroom or private space. This can be done as short breaks throughout your study session. It also should not prevent you from being able to fall asleep later that night. See tutorial: https://student.korumindfulness.org/resources.html.

When you have trouble falling asleep, you can try belly breathing. Belly breathing can help with relaxation, which can be what is needed to fall asleep during a stressful time. See tutorial: https://student.korumindfulness.org/resources.html.

Dr. Weinstein recommends scheduling “down time” with your studying.

If you try to study 24/7, you’re going to burn out. It’s literally not possible to constantly study without breaks. Schedule your breaks–actually put them on your calendar and write what you will do in that free time.

Dr. Weinstein doesn’t practice mindfulness, but recommends the following preferred ways to take study breaks:

1. Watching reruns of her favorite TV shows including The West Wing, Gilmore Girls, Grey’s Anatomy, After Life, and The Good Wife.
2. Taking her puppy for a walk. Get some fresh air!
3. Dance it out — put on your favorite music and have a 10 minute private dance party. (But please don’t do this in the library!)
4. Call a friend and talk about anything OTHER than studying for 15-20 minutes.
5. Cook a healthy meal. Eating junk food and guzzling coffee (as delicious as coffee definitely is) won’t fuel your brain in the way you think. Get protein!

REMEMBER TO SLEEP!

We know that finals are stressful, and that stress and anxiety over getting all of your assignments and studying done are not conditions that are conductive to a good night’s sleep. Try to get at least six hours per night! Seven to nine hours is ideal, but we understand that that amount of time is possibly unrealistic.

STUDY TIPS!

There are lots of ways to study for exams and get those papers done. Here are some tips from the professionals:

1. “Spew and edit” –for papers, it’s important to get your ideas on paper. Then you can revise and make them pretty.
2. Study groups: Particularly useful for classes that have problem sets, so you can share answers and help your peers (and get help) when you go wrong. Plus, the comradery will help keep you energized and accountable.
3. Find a place where YOU study best. Do you like background noise or do you prefer perfect quiet? Do some studying in a coffee shop if you like the noise; or lock yourself on the top floor of the library if you prefer silence. If you’re a freshman, you might not yet know how you best study, so try both and figure it out! (There is no “right” way though so many people laud the benefits of quiet.)
4. Find a friend to be an “accountability buddy.” This strategy is popular with people who have specific goals. Tell someone the goal, and then have them call you to keep you accountable. Include a small “punishment” if you don’t meet the goal. For example: If you tell your friend Sally that you’re going to finish writing your History paper by 6pm on Tuesday, have her call you at 6pm on Tuesday to ask if you’ve finished. If you have, awesome! If you haven’t, perhaps your “punishment” is that you have to buy her lunch the next time you see each other.
5. Stop with the flash cards, unless you are dealing with a class that calls ONLY for memorization.
   1. Flashcards are good for memorizing vocabulary and forumulae, but they are useless for most other types of studying.
6. Explain the course content to someone else. Find a parent, grandparent, sibling, cousin, friend, whoever –and teach them the content that you will be tested on. Tell them to ask questions as you go. If the material makes sense and you can explain it to someone else, then you’ll know you have a good grasp on it yourself.

Unsure how to prepare for a class?

ASK THE PROFESSOR!

This is literally what office hours are for. The professor wrote the test, and will know best how to study for it. Don’t be shy–go ask! Going to office hours is also a great way for the professor to know who you are, which can only work to your advantage.

WE WISH YOU ALL THE BEST OF LUCK ON YOUR FINALS!

Warmly,

Ms. Sadhoo, Ms. Tanzman, & Dr. Weinstein

This week we have the pleasure of getting to know our new Director of Macaulay-Queens, Ms. Taruna Sadhoo.

Where did you grow up and what’s your family like?  

I was born in Guyana, South America but grew up in Flushing, Queens. I feel very lucky to have grown up in one of the most diverse areas of the world – without a doubt it contributed to my passion for international/cultural exchange and global citizenship. I am a proud mom, wife, sister, and aunt, and come from a family that believes in giving back to others through service, civic engagement, and within our careers. 

Where did you go to college and what did you major in? 

I earned a Masters degree in Higher and Post-Secondary Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and have a BA degree in Psychology from Queens College. 

What did you do before becoming MHC Director at Queens College? 

Prior to my current role, I was the Director of Experiential Education at Queens College. Within this role, I assisted in developing internship opportunities for over 700 students, providing them with meaningful internship experiences on and off campus and collectively securing over $1.5 million in funding for these programs. As an adjunct lecturer, I also taught a COOP World of Work course providing students with the experiences and skills needed to succeed in the professional setting prior to and upon graduation. Part of this course included each student exploring what global citizenship means to them and how they better understand and take action in their own communities on supporting the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We also successfully partnered with fellow college students at The American University in Cairo to get their perspectives on what global citizenship and the SDGs mean to them.

Prior to my return to QC three years ago, I was the senior director of Community Engagement at UNICEF USA. In this role, I was responsible for leading the development, management, and expansion of the organization’s community, youth, and volunteer engagement and mobilization strategy for over 40,000 volunteers. While at UNICEF USA, I was also instrumental in the management and expansion of the Global Citizenship Fellowship, a highly competitive, full-time, 24-month program that prepares diverse, committed, and globally minded individuals for effective leadership in public service. 

What do you love about your new job? I am passionate about this role as it allows me to bring together all of the skills, knowledge, and expertise I’ve garnered over the last 20 years to serve and empower students within MHC – ensuring a robust, successful, and rewarding experience for students and alumni. Serving students and alumni is what drives my work – how do we create the set of professional and further educational opportunities that complements what they have learned in the classroom. We have an incredibly talented student body and a key part of my role here is learning about the career and professional interests of our students. Our doors here at MHC are open for students and alumni to meet with us for advising so we can point out the scholarships and professional opportunities that enrich their experience here at QC and beyond. 

What is/are your favorite book(s)? Music? Movie(s)? I have two favorite movies – It’s a Wonderful Life and The Shawshank Redemption – so many nuggets of wisdom within both of these scripts. I enjoy reading and learning from all types of books. However, my favorite books are memoirs and autobiographies. I’m currently reading the following books, Poison Ivy: How Elite College Divide Us by Evan Mandery; Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah; White Debt:The Demerara Uprising and Britain’s Legacy of Slavery by Thomas Harding. I am open to listening to all types of music – however, my favorites include Country, Soca, Indian and Reggae music. 

Are there any issues/causes that you are particularly passionate about? I am passionate about children’s rights, access to education for marginalized populations, international development and equity, access, and diversity in higher education. 

If you weren’t working at a university, what would your dream job be? This is my dream job and institution – I mean it! As a CUNY graduate and higher education professional, it has always been my professional dream to give back to the institution that has played an instrumental role in my life and that of the community in which I live.  

What are your favorite ways to spend your leisure time? I enjoy spending time with my children, husband, family and friends celebrating life, laughing and eating a good meal. 

What does a “good life” mean to you? It means being celebrating all the good things we have. I believe that no matter how challenging life may get, there are always rainbows to be found.

Are you one of the people who repeatedly clicks “remind me tomorrow” when your computer annoys you with an update?

If yes, stop doing that and update your computer when it tells you to do so.

Do the same for the apps on your phone.

These updates are sometimes cosmetic, and you obviously don’t need those updates. But any update that fixes a “bug” is an essential update for your computer or phone.

Why?

Because hackers use “bugs” to enter your devices and steal your information. Companies like Apple and Google work hard to fix bugs so that bad actors (sometimes known as Black Hat hackers) can’t take advantageof what are known as “zero-day exploits” to hack your device, and thousands or even millions of other devices.

Updating your computer and phone, including all the apps, will patch any known bugs so that your system is better protected.

So stop clicking “remind me tomorrow.” And while I’m on the subject, also enable two-factor authentication (2FA) on your email, banking, and healthcare websites and apps!

You absolutely cannot be too careful.

The 2022 midterm elections are Tuesday, November 8th –one week from today.

If you are eligible–18 years or older, and an American citizen–we urge you to exercise your constitutional right to vote.

Find out whether you’re registered to vote, where your polling place is, and what the ballot looks like here.

Then create a plan to get to your polling place. Drive or accompany other people if necessary. Spread the word.

With our ear to the social media grindstone, we have heard a lot of statements that sound like this:

1. “Why vote? I live in NYC. It’s going to be a Democrat whether I vote or not.”
2. “Voting is a waste of time. The two parties are both capitalist parties that support existing institutions and resist reform. It doesn’t matter.”
3. “I’m not voting until someone comes up with an idea worth getting off of my ass for.”

If you’ve ever made a statement like this, we strongly urge you to reconsider.

Voting will only remain a right as long as we avail of it. When you stop availing of your constitutional rights, they can begin to whither on the vine. In some states, so-called “poll watchers” are standing near polling places with loaded guns. We cannot be intimidated out of voting, even if the election in your district is close to a foregone conclusion.

The gubernatorial race (that’s for governor) in New York is closer than most people had predicted. Your vote DOES matter in this race. To learn about the candidates’ policy positions, click here.

This election is in large part a referendum on whether Democrats are on the right side of the investigation into the insurrection of 6 January 2021, which they have devoted a great deal of time to digging into, both in public and in private. Is this a good use of their time? Weigh in by voting!

A man named David DePape recently broke into the home of Speaker Pelosi attempting to kidnap her, meanwhile attacking her husband. Is political violence acceptable to you? Do you want it to become more widespread? Is it acceptable in certain circumstances? If people don’t vote or are disenfranchised, violence will become more widespread. Make your voice heard the American way: by voting!

What this election IS NOT:

A referendum on inflation. We all agree that inflation is out of control. The government has little to no control over it, despite what many pundits want you to think. The government has a few tools at its disposal to attempt to quell inflation and bring down gas prices, but this ability is limited at best.

Reject Election Disinformation:

1. Voting machines are trustworthy.
2. No one is “harvesting” ballots.
3. The notion that “Jews control the election” is antisemitic racism.
4. Democrats do not run a sex-trafficking ring, nor do they eat babies.
5. Joe Biden lawfully won the 2020 presidential election.
6. Critical Race Theory is not being taught to kindergarteners.
7. Bail reform does not lead to more crime.

The British journalist and human-behavior expert Oliver Burkeman wrote in The Guardian:

When you approach life as a sequence of milestones to be achieved, you exist “in a state of near-continuous failure.” Almost all the time, by definition, you’re not at the place you’ve defined as embodying accomplishment or success. And should you get there, you’ll find you’ve lost the very thing that gave you a sense of purpose–so you’ll formulate a new goal and start again.

When I taught at high school at an “elite” private school in the Bronx, most of my students looked at their classes as transactional experiences: They wrote articulate, well-researched history papers, and I give them A’s. Despite the stellar work, I found little love of learning for its own sake among my students; rather, it was about getting through high school as fast as possible.

To get to what, exactly?

For most of them, it was whatever highly competitive college they wanted to go to. Which they then raced through as fast as possible to get to…. what? Medical school, law school, business school, or their hedge fund job.

And then what? They got the grades, they got the job, they earned the money. Maybe a few of them found love along the way, but more of them found hookups. Where is the meaning in their lives coming from?

The renowned psychologist Martin Seligman’s research, which founded the field of positive psychology, demonstrates that there are five elements to a fulfilling life, which you can remember with the acronym PERMA:

Positive emotion

Engagement

Relationships

Meaning

Achievement

Note that the thing that all of my students were chasing–achievements–is only 1/5 of a satisfying life. There are four other parts that don’t have anything to do with accomplishments, degrees, jobs, or money.

Therefore, as Burkeman noted, there are serious downsides to finding purpose in your accomplishments–especially exclusively in your accomplishments–because then you will continually set new ones–and so you’ll never be where you want to go. You can’t possibly get “there” if you keep changing the finish line.

In the spirit of this quotation, I urge you all to embrace your time as a college student. Take a class on a subject you think you’d hate–because you never know, and when will you have the opportunity again? Study abroad and experience a new culture for a few weeks or a few months. What will you learn about yourself?

Don’t make your experience at Macaulay Honors College at QC a transactional one. I hope you’ll embrace learning and enjoy the journey, not merely the diploma at the end.

Dear Freshmen & Sophomores,

Please note that registration for both Winter and Spring 2023 is approaching. 

1. SCHEDULE AN ADVISING APPOINTMENT NOW

• You are required to have your classes approved prior to registration. If you do not schedule an appointment (and meet with your advisor) before October 26, a Macaulay Honors hold will be placed on your account preventing you from enrolling into courses.

• Book a time slot ASAP. There are a limited number of slots. If you wait to make an appointment, you may not be able to meet with your advisor before October 26.

• Drop-in hours are not to be used for early registration advising meetings.

• **You must email your advisor a pdf of your Degreeworks audit and a completed tentative registration grid (use this template and complete all three schedules) 24 hours before your appointment. If you don’t do this, your appointment will be cancelled.**

**You are expected to meet with your advisor before the schedule of classes is released. Please use the Undergraduate Bulletin, your Degreeworks, and information on your department’s webpages to create tentative schedules before your appointment.

• Weinstein’s students: Schedule a meeting here
• Tanzman’s students: Schedule a meeting here

2. REGISTERING FOR A WINTER CLASS?

• Macaulay Winter Session Tuition Policy
• As always, the Macaulay scholarship is only applied after financial aid. If you want to know the impact that taking a winter class will have on your Spring 2023 financial aid refund (for students that receive financial aid refunds), please meet with a QC financial aid advisor.

3. OTHER IMPORTANT LINKS:

• Tuition Scholarship Policy
• Experiential Learning Requirements: click on “experiential learning requirements” at the bottom
• Internship Learning Agreement Form and Internship Evaluation are available on Handshake.
• Study Abroad Evaluation Form
• Community Service Requirements and form

4. Update about seminar sections:

• You will not be selecting a seminar section during your early registration advising meeting. You will be enrolling yourself in a section on the day of early registration.
• Please note that you should still make an early registration advising meeting ASAP, since we cannot create additional time slots to meet with students.

The Opportunities Fund access period will be from September 6-23.

Important Updates:

All Applicants:

Emailing your Professors and Macaulay or QC Staff

Throughout your four years as a Macaulay-Queens student, you will inevitably have a litany of questions related to coursework, requirements, registration, activities, parking, and another thousand things not listed here. To obtain answers, you may have to contact a professor or staff member if you can’t find the information online.

One of the most important skills to learn early in your time with us is how to compose an email to a professor or staff member that will elicit the response you want. If you follow these basic guidelines, you are more likely to be successful.

Your professors and staff are not your friends.

This means that you should make your emails formal unless you are told to do otherwise. When in doubt, use a formal address. As in: “Dear Professor Chen….”

Include a subject line that is specific.

First and foremost, NEVER leave the subject line blank. Emails with blank subject lines are unlikely to be opened, as this is a common feature of spam.

You should also be specific. “Question about today’s class” is NOT specific because it does not say which class. Most professors teach multiple classes. Instead, write “Question about today’s lecture in Anthro101.”

Keep your email as concise as possible.

Professors and staff are busy. We receive scores of emails per day. Get to the point. If you have a question about, say, community service requirements for Macaulay, ask it directly. For example, you could ask your advisor, “I’m interested in volunteering at an animal shelter. Does this work count as community service?”

Try to look up the information before sending an email.

There is a lot of information available on Macaulay’s website, Queens College’s website, and this very website! Professors and staff will be irritated if you ask a question to which there is a readily available answer online.

Sign your name and include your EMPLID.

Obviously, all emails should be signed. But, don’t merely sign “Sincerely, Lucy.” How many people named Lucy do you think a professor or advisor might have? Include your last name! And–this part is important–if you’re asking your professor or advisor to do something for you, such as register you for a class or check something related to your record, you must include your EMPLID. Otherwise, the person you’re emailing will have to look it up and that takes time and so you are less likely to receive a prompt response, if you receive one at all.

If you follow these simple guidelines, you will send effective, respectful emails and you are increasingly like to receive prompt replies.