The Rush of Foundation Studies + Tips on Handling It

'Ah sudah, 4 assignment kena siap hujung minggu ni? Cukup ke masa?' 'I got 2 essays, 3 short videos and I also have a substitute class during the night.'

It's not foreign or strange for us to listen to students complaining about how busy or pack their schedule is. I believe you, yourself, had either complained the same thing or experienced your peers complaining about it. It has come to my attention that many students (in this context, the juniors) are experiencing a phase in which is called the Overwhelmed-With-Studies phase. In this article, I will discuss on a few matters to aid you in this journey - a brief understanding of this phase, my experience on it and ways to overcome it.

WHAT IS OVERWHELMED-WITH-STUDIES PHASE?

Let's do some checking and see whether are you experiencing this phase or not. Grab a pen and a piece of paper if you want, or manually jotting it down in your mind the answer to these questions. The answer is only a mere 'Yes' or 'No'.

1. Are you feeling like a mess right now, as if you are not organised with keeping track of your assignments, lecturers and your life as a whole?
   

2. Are you (without you knowing) slowly isolating yourself from other people and lacking the motivation to be productive?
   

3. Are you having a very off/weird sleeping pattern which is not consistent (barely sleeping or sleeping very late at night)?
   

4. Are you having headaches and migraines from your studies?

If your answers are prone to be 'Yes', then you, my friend (junior etc), encounter this phase that I have mentioned above. The overwhelmed-with-studies phase refers to a period of your time (be it from several hours to days, weeks and months) in which you feel like you are not capable of having full control over the progress of your studies. You might feel like you want to break down crying due to the immense (unknowingly) pressure and environment that sadly, you are indulging in. Several factors in which leads to you facing this phase such as follows:

1. Organising You may have not developed a habit of listing your works, tasks and lectures which end up you doing work at the last minute. In addition, with new work piling up, it would not a shocking if you experience this phase.
   

2. Procrastinating or No Proper Outline Are you the type to do work without drafting your outline? It is extremely dangerous as you may have wasted hours trying to find a purpose/lead in how you would like to approach in answering the assignments. Since you did not make a draft outline of the progress of your work, it becomes definite that there are higher chances you might have found yourself in the procrastinating period.
   

3. Exposure This might happen for those who have little to no exposure or experience in having a packed schedule. As Law Foundation is prepped for a quick route for you to earn a degree (more or less 10 months in total), the nature of it is not the norm for high school students who came from a school in which does not promote (highly) active co-curriculum and outdoor activities.

MY FAIR SHARE ON OVERWHELMED-WITH-STUDIES PHASE THROUGHOUT MY STUDIES

To be exact, I have been exposed towards this phase from an early age of 13 when I joined my high school's students association. However, my phase was not centred on education but towards co-curricular activities. I have to juggle several projects from school-level to national-level and this also includes my participation with debate and Model United Nations (MUN). Bearing this in mind, it is common for me to have an exhaustive schedule every day despite coming from a normal high school (not MRSM and SBP). A typical schedule for me during my high school years would be as follow:

• 6:15 am - Getting ready to go to school

• 7:00 am - Studying in school

• 2:30 pm - School session is over, I will take lunch and do my prayers

• 3:00 pm - Either having extra classes/ Japanese Language classes/ co-curricular activities

• 5:00 pm - Classes is over and prep my homework while waiting for my parents to fetch me

• 6:00 pm - Parents fetch me and have dinner then head home

• 8:00 pm - Tuition for me to pick up the lessons that I missed whenever I'm not in school due to activities which require me to be outside of the school grounds

• 10.00 pm - Heads home and finish up homework

• 2:00 am - Head to sleep

Hence, I would conclude that my schedule in Asasi (Foundation) year is roughly the same as stated above. However, I have managed to adapt to a proper schedule roughly after a month studying. In Asasi, I learn how to micromanage my time well that I even have time to do extra activities such as MUN-ing almost once a month (I have the privilege to join 4 MUN Conferences in my first semester but none for the second semester due to Covid-19) and have mini adventures in Putrajaya and Kuala Lumpur. This is a typical schedule for me during my Asasi studies:

• 3:00 am - Prep for the day (Do to-do-list, update assignment progress and track lectures)

• 3:15 am - Finish yesterday given tutorial sheet (20 minutes/tutorial question)

• 4:00 am - Read through pre-lecture notes and manual for today's lecture (All of the subjects)

• 6:45 am - Gets ready to class and get some light breakfast if I'm feeling very hungry

• 8:00 am - Class starts

• 12:00 pm/1:00 pm - Grab a heavy lunch (rice with veggies and protein and a drink)

• 2:00 pm - Class continues

• 6.15 pm - Have dinner with friends/housemates and then head back to my room

• 8:00 pm - Group discussion/Debate practice

• 9:00 pm - Sleep (If I'm having any discussion or debate practice, I'll sleep around 10:15 pm which is after the session)

I would like to remind you that although I do not necessarily have an overwhelmed-with-studies phase because I have been exposed with this environment from a young age and I soon realised it and tried my best to adapt to it. I can execute it with excellence is when I developed a trustful organising system which works for me during Asasi. I try to avoid getting anywhere near the phase by making sure I finish all my work as soon as I can, no buts. You have to be strict when it comes to this principle as it develops your self-discipline.

THE NEXT QUESTION NOW LIES - WHAT SHOULD YOU DO WITH IT?

Since you are most likely having this phase, the obvious question would be 'What am I going to do to put an end to this situation?'. These are several recommendations in which I have done throughout my study period in overcoming the stated phase:

• Develop an organising system to know the progress of your tasks and timetable (could be a to-do-list, journalling method or my fav, setting reminders on my phone via my calendar for every work need to be handed in/finished).

• Have an efficient calendar system in which you can commit and the interface is easily understandable such as Google Calendar or Iphone's Calendar.
  

• Make an outline which includes the timestamp of every work like below. This one is for this week to-do-list. By using this method, you can keep track of your progress and if you view it from a daily perspective, you will most likely not procrastinate and finish your work on the exact time that you set!
  

• Make sure your workplace is clean so you can work in ease. Try to decorate your study table with recycled containers to place your extra pens or place your favourite room fragrance on your table.
  

• Place your books and tutorial works neatly in the shelf provided at your campus. For tutorial sheets, I tend to put them in a binder/file or have it available online in my Google Drive. Stack these materials according to the ones you need to hand in first at the top/right and the most below/far left which is recent and the deadline should be later.
  

• Try your best to finish all the work as soon as possible and do not drag it to the last minute. Do not set the final period to do the work on the dateline of the task itself but leave 2-3 days so you have time to review your answers and make any changes.
  

• Know the labels well; which is which. You should prioritise your assignments first, then tutorial/quiz sheets which bring marks in the final grading, next, other tutorial questions to be discussed and lastly, your homework.
  

• Finish your homework during breaks and spend a good hour or two for assignments/quiz/tutorial that brings actual marks for your grading (usually during the night). If your class is dismissed early, rush yourself to finish that homework.
  

• Lastly, have some quality for yourself and have a strong support system which can be from your friends, family members, partner or even your online gaming community.

CONCLUSION

With the aforementioned tips, I hope it serves a great purpose on how you could overcome the overwhelmed-with-studies phase efficiently. Just remember, that it is normal for you to face this phase but most importantly, for you to take a breather when you realise that you are experiencing it. I would end this article with some essence you may ponder upon "It's never an issue of not having enough time. Everyone in the world has 24 hours per day but how can other people manage to finish all the tasks that they are assigned? The only issue you have is whether you know how to manage your time efficiently or not. Once you can manage it, you would never encounter such problems of having a limited period of time to finish your work."

The author of this article is Elisa Shafiqah and the editor of this article is Hifzhan Hafiy. Elisa Shafiqah is a Foundation in Law KPTM of UiTM Centre of Foundation Studies, Dengkil graduate and author of From Elisa's Desk. The views expressed here are entirely the author’s own opinions and it does not purport to reflect the views of any institution. For more information or to get to know her, visit https://linktr.ee/lawtutoring.