One of the most stressful times of the year is the end of the Spring semester. Most people are preparing to go home, setting up summer internships or summer jobs, all while trying to finish out the last semester of the year with the grades they need. That being said, something you’ll want to put some thought into ahead of time is how you are going to balance finals and move-outs.
Hopefully, your preparation for your end-of-the-year finals will start weeks ahead of your preparation for moving out. I’m not saying not to have a plan for the day you chose to check out of your dorm, but you’ll need to start studying for your finals long before you’ll need to start packing up all your belongings.
The key to making sure you’re not overwhelmed during finals week is to do most of your studying in the 2-3 weeks beforehand. Giving yourself a decent amount of time to make sure you have all of your assignments in, finish up any final projects and have time to truly absorb all the necessary information for your exams is one of the only ways to guarantee you don’t have to cram during the last week of school.
In college, final exams and projects are usually a large portion of your final grade. This causes finals to often be a make it or break it situation for many students. Depending on how the professor chooses to calculate your final grade, whatever you receive on the final exam or project could mean moving up or down at least one whole grade level. This is why you want to be diligent and consistent in your study efforts. Many of you are taking around four to five credit courses, so it is best to make a schedule or plan for studying. Two common studying techniques is to either study each course topic for a minimum of 30 minutes to an hour everyday or to study for a few of your classes one day and then study for the rest the next day. The second technique is meant to give you more time — around one to three hours— to study one topic, while switching off what classes you’re studying for on a day-to-day basis.
Studying early will ensure that you have enough time in between your actual finals to start your move-out process during the last week. The goal is to be nearly complete with any projects so you only have to work on final touches, and to have learned all the necessary information so you only have to review before you take the actual exam.
When it comes to preparing to move-out of the dorms, there are really only three things you need to do ahead of time: schedule your moveout appointment with the residential life office for your dormitory, gather any packing and cleaning supplies you think you’ll need, and communicate with your family/loved ones about how you’re getting home and who you’re staying with.
Obviously the first thing you want to do is plan with your people back at home or, if you’re doing an internship, making sure you have everything in order to start working. Things you might want to consider include things like if you’ll need someone to come out and help you move everything out of your dorm, if you’ll need an extra car for all your stuff, if you prefer to leave your stuff close to campus and get a storage unit, where are you going to keep all your things back home, if you have all your paperwork submitted for your job, what day you want to leave campus, etc…. There’s a lot of things that go into moving out of your dorm, and you want to make sure you cover all your bases.
Secondly, Langston does have some pretty strict move-out policies. The Office of Residential Life does require you to book a move-out appointment. This just means that once you have all of your things out of the dorm, you will have to go to the club house to check out. During checkout, the assigned residential assistant for your building will go back with you to do a final walk through before turning in your key. This is also when you’ll find out if you are receiving any fines for damage, uncleanliness and violations to housing policies.
Those hefty fines are the reason you want to make sure that you have all the supplies you need to pack up everything that you brought into that dorm and to clean up all of the private and shared areas. It’s recommended that you try and stock up on boxes, packing materials, tape, and cleaning supplies at least a week or two before you need to start packing. Remember, every student in the state is gearing up to also move-out of their campus housing, so supplies start to dwindle quickly.
Lastly, you want to give yourself at least a couple days if not the whole week to get all of your packing done. It does depend on how much stuff you have in your dorm, but starting early will make sure that you’re not adding the stress of last-minute packing to the stress of taking your finals. You want to try and make packing as easy as possible, so it’s one less thing you have to worry about. The easiest way to go about putting all of your items is to start by getting rid of anything you don’t need or don’t plan on keeping. Then you want to pack up anything that you’re not going to have to use within those last couple days. That could mean decorations, kitchen supplies, clothes and anything you deem unnecessary. Once that is done, you can pack up the rest of your stuff in the days leading up to your check out appointment.
No matter what it takes, you want to make sure you are completely out of your dorm by the Sunday after graduation by 12:00pm, which is the last day of move-outs. If you’re not out by the end of the last move-out appointment time, you will receive a large fine. Think about it this way, if you’re not out when they tell you, you’re the reason why a handful of residential employees will have to stay longer to finish up after you leave. Their time costs money, so make sure you’re out on time.
It may sound like a lot, but trust me, you will have plenty of time to get the hang of it. Living on campus pretty much guarantees you become a master packer and professional mover. It will get easier over time, but hopefully this helps you mentally and physically prepare for that last grueling week of your freshman year classes.
Sasha Ndisabiye
Sasha Ndisabiye is a 2024 graduate of Langston University with a degree in broadcast journalism. She previously served as Editor-in-Chief of The Gazette.
