Photo by Will Kanellos

It’s almost the end of fall term, a.k.a. The Hardest Term Of The Year. It’s the time when students are forced to switch from Summer Mode to School Mode. The transformation becomes complete during Finals Week, when droopy-eyed, sweatpants-wearing zombies that once passed as students invade campus.
But it doesn’t have to be this way! Behold, the Ethos Guide to Finals Week. Think of it as your guides to a sketchy, dangerous, but ultimately beneficial time of college—towel not required.

1. Know your finals schedule. Don’t be one of them who get huge eyes in the middle of class because the final is two days earlier than they thought. Plan out your entire week beforehand so there’s as little surprise as possible. This includes not only tests but office hours, irregular work shifts and goodbye parties.
2. Stake out your space. Hopefully by now you’ve found your “sweet spot,” the location where your brain kicks in like nowhere else—the library, your room, the dorm lounge, etc. If not, find it pronto and stay there. Keep returning so that your mind can easily flow into Study Mode.
3. Have a playlist. If you study to music, now’s the time to break out your list of Greatest Hits. And if you don’t, you might still want a mix to put on when your brain needs to take a break for a little while. A lot of people people find uncomplicated, minimalist songs (i.e. Phillip Glass or The Radio Dept.) best to study to.
4. Don’t avoid studying because you’re scared of performing poorly. This often happens to students who didn’t expect a certain class to be as hard as it did. They become afraid of doing badly in the class overall, and so avoid confronting the material. Resist this! Just dive into the material, and try to become familiar enough with it so that it’s no longer intimidating.
5. No time for everything? That’s okay. A lot of guides recommend that students try to exercise or meditate to reduce stress during Finals Week. This is very good advice, but sometimes there just isn’t enough time to study and do health-affirming activities. This is perfectly normal. Finals Week (and Dead Week too) is a very short period of time, and working to improve your grades might feel like a higher priority than your typical exercise/sleep/Call of Duty routine. Make an effort to forgive yourself for any health sacrifices you might have to make. There will be time to compensate for them later.
6. Lose your ego. One of my friends seems to grow a cleaning compulsion right around the time of Finals Week. To basically keep herself from going crazy from stress, she cleans her apartment to the point of hospital sterility. Another friend rubs his head whenever he feels nervous, which leads to a very rumpled look for him in weeks 8 through 10. Stress-coping strategies, even if weird or quirky, are nothing to be ashamed of. If you fight them, you’ll just end up stressing yourself even more.
7. Be secure in your friendships. Just because you may have to spend a lot of time alone studying does not mean your friends are off partying without you. They’re probably studying too, or else their free time just isn’t at the same time as yours. Do what you need to do in order to do well on your final exams. People will still be there.
8. Acknowledge that people around you are also stressed. Your roommate might have snapped at you this morning about the dirty bathroom, but it may have been because he was stressed about his back-to-back paper deadlines . The woman who snubbed you on the bus last night may have had a practical final the next day she didn’t feel ready for. In short, practically no one is on their best game during Finals Week. Let the small things go, and everyone will end up happier.
9. Have an escape plan. It often serves as great motivation to solidify your winter break plans before Finals Week even begins. When the light at the end of the tunnel is visible, the tunnel itself seems a lot shorter.