If this first week back feels harder than expected, you’re not imagining it. The post–Reading Break hangover is real. Classes resume and suddenly projects are due, midterms land, quizzes reappear, and deadlines that felt manageable in February now feel immediate. The pause is over. The pace is back. Part of this is structural. Professors often […]
One of the most underestimated academic tools isn’t an app, a planner, or a study technique. It’s simply asking for help. Many students wait far too long before checking in with a professor or TA. Not because they don’t care — but because assumptions quietly get in the way. We assume we should already understand. […]
Group work is one of the most common — and most misunderstood — parts of a semester. For many students, the word alone brings mixed reactions. Some enjoy collaboration. Others immediately think about uneven effort, unclear communication, or carrying more than their share. The reality is that group work almost always comes with challenges, but […]
Making it to February matters more than students often realize. The first month of the semester is rarely smooth, even when things look “fine” on the surface. January is about adjustment — new routines, new expectations, new demands on time and energy. If you’ve shown up, stayed engaged, and kept moving forward through the first […]
Reaching the end of Week 3 is often where the semester quietly shifts. The early-term motivation that carried many students through the first couple of weeks starts to fade. Skills that felt front-of-mind in January — time management, planning, intentional study routines — don’t disappear, but they can begin to take a back seat as […]
This week includes one of those deadlines that doesn’t feel urgent — until it’s gone. Add/Drop deadlines (for example, UBC’s this Friday) are often treated as paperwork. In reality, they’re strategic checkpoints. Once that date passes, your schedule is locked. If a course isn’t working, feels misaligned, or is already demanding more than you realistically […]
It’s been a while since the last blog. In the meantime, life has been full in good ways. I’ve had the excitement—and the real reward—of coaching academic coaches, and of developing and delivering a series of workshops through the fall term for advisors at a community college. Thoughtful people, good questions, practical conversations about how […]
This week I’m preparing a series of learning strategist workshops for student advisors at a post-secondary campus. In other words, I’ll be coaching the coaches. If you’ve been following my blog, you will have a pretty good idea of the content of these workshops. As I’m preparing them, I’m reflecting on the college advisors I’ll […]
First, a shoutout to summer session students facing exams this next couple of weeks: My exam checklist is one of my most trafficked blogs, so here’s the link: https://www.stevevogel.net/exam-week-june-checklist/ Let me know how it goes! Shifting now to summer’s end, the school supply ads are spamming your inbox and look at that–there’s only a couple […]
How far can we trust AI? We often just don’t know if AI is right, wrong, hallucinating, or biased. OK. How can we tell when to trust, when to check? You can’t 100 per cent tell when AI is 100 per cent right–but you can reduce your risks while still gaining the tremendous benefits of […]