Living Off Campus

Deciding to go to a college or university is gonna be one of the biggest decisions of your life. When deciding to further your education there are many choices you will need to make. Some of the big decisions are what college or university you will be attending? How you will fund your education? What your major focus of studies will be when you get to college? But one of the biggest decisions many students face is where they will live when they start college. Sometimes this is an easy decision that seems to be made already for you and at other times it is a very difficult decision. Most of the newer students that do struggle with this decision tend to live close to their campuses, and question whether or not to remain with their family while attending school.

Living on campus can have many benefits. The school is closer to you so you may not need private transportation and can therefore save money for gas or for a car completely. Also this can be a benefit because you may tend to skip less and be late less when you are very close to the classroom. When you choose on campus housing your social life also tends to improve having friends so close, but beware this can also cause a drop in grades. Living in campus also can simplify your life a little because you will not need to worry about most monthly bills that you would have if you had a student apartment, and some students also get a meal plan makes grocery shopping easier. However there are some downfalls to living on the campus as well. There is less privacy as on average you can have anywhere from 1-6 roommates. This can make it noisier, harder to study and get work done, and can make your living quarters feel very small.

Living off campus can also have its rewards. Off campus housing tends to offer more privacy so it can be easier to get studying done. Living off campus you will have less rules and more of a sense of independence. Living outside of university housing can also better prepares you for living on your own after college as you will have more of a sense of responsibility when it comes to paying bill, budgeting, and prioritizing. One of the biggest downfalls to off campus living is it tends to be much more expensive then dorming you will need to buy more groceries, more monthly bills, and most likely more cost towards transportation. The other big downfall is there is less security as most campuses have on campus security guards.

There are many different types of student housing when staying on campus. Most freshmen start out in dormitories and sometimes don't have a choice in their roommates. After freshmen year there tends to be a little more choice in the matter and you can stay in dormitories, residence halls, and mostly for seniors town houses or villas. It is usually recommended that students live on campus for at least one year to get the full college experience, but many choose to never live on campus for many different reasons. Living on campus tends to get you better situated with the lay out of your new campus. Campus maps will guide you along the way. However when you live on your campus it forces you to get to know where things are and how to get around. There are many websites to help guide you toward a student apartment. Your university bookstore may also have information to help you find student apartments in your area.

Student Today Today students sharing blog and tips.

Resume Writing Advice to Get Your Dream Job

When you are trying to get a job, the best place to start is with a resume. This is true of any job, and you will need to take your time putting the resume together. Even if you are applying for a job that has a physical application, you will need to provide a resume. Not only is it a good way to present your experience, it will also do a great job of showing that you are a professional.

When you are writing your resume, you should definitely follow this resume writing advice. It would be best to make sure you format it properly. The first tip that you will need to follow of course, is keeping your resume to a single page. Chances are that the potential employer is going to only read the first page anyway, so make sure you fit everything on there that needs to be there.

When we say 'needs to be there', we mean that if you have many years worth of experience, you should always list the most recent. One thing to note is that you do not want to list any employment gaps. If there has been a brief or even long period that you spent unemployed, then it would be best to get a bit of volunteer experience between now and the time you apply for this new job. If you cannot think of a way to do this, then you might want to consult a resume writing expert so that they can help you to fill those gaps.

In addition to that you will need to list your education. First of all, make sure you list your high school education or even a vocational school if you happened to graduate from one. After that you will need to list your college or university experience, but it would be wise to only list these if you graduated from them. Any certifications you happen to have need to be listed in another category, specifically the skills category. Anything you are good at which is related to the job you are trying to get should be listed, even if you are not an expert.

In addition to the resume you should also have a good cover letter. This letter will describe everything that you are and what you plan to bring to the company. One thing that you should note however is that you cannot make a generic cover letter for every company. You need to customize your cover letter for each company that you apply for, and in the letter you should demonstrate that you know things about the company. This could include any mergers they are having as well as any new products that they are going to launch.

Writing a resume can be difficult and exhausting; no one can deny that. One thing to remember though, is that once you land that job you have always wanted, you will find that writing the resume was actually the best thing you could have done. So without further delay, it's time to start writing.

Restructuring Education

The Huffington Post "Obama Education Waiver Plan" of 8/10/2011 speaks of wavering parts of the No Child Left Behind program to modernize education. From my perspective, we can try to patch our education system through rigid standards and waivers, but the full potential of educating our children cannot be reached if we continue to apply an incomplete definition of education, as "the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life."

An "enduring" State is founded on culture, dominated by ideals, and motivated by service attained when its citizens have been raised with the personal commitment to develop a well-balanced personality, leading us to a companion definition for education:

"The acquirement of skills, the pursuit of wisdom, a realization of self, and the attainment of spiritual values."

To achieve this definition, education must cultivate the three endowments of the human mind: intelligence, moral awareness and spiritual insight. Together, these endowments create the harmonious development of the human personality, and bring us the PURPOSE of education: to be fully empowered to contribute one's best to the advancement of self and civilization. Through the development of intelligence we hone our skills and cultivate our reasoning and emotional abilities.

What about moral awareness? Our expanding social structure has readily adapted to intellectual and scientific growth, but abounding technological achievements have eclipsed the moral ethics that the home institution once provided. And ethics is the external social mirror that faithfully reflects the inner development of the members of society.

The home and family - the crowning glory of a long and arduous evolutionary struggle - is the natural social arena for the development of ethics: patience, altruism, forbearance and tolerance, all essential for peace and progress. Home ethics is one of civilization's only hope for survival.

And spiritual insight? Living faith is what empowers individuals to elevate morality to the spiritual levels of unselfish service. To constrain living faith in civil interaction is like removing the sails of a sailboat. It is wise to separate religious institutions from education and government, but it is true religion - the desire to find and know God - that organizes the human personality in an ascent to higher levels of love and devotion, of service and fellowship.

The time is NOW to recognize that the educational concept and definition should include cultivation of the three endowments of the human mind; that modifications to our education system alone will not achieve the result we seek in our children without the edification of home life and the progressive force of living faith.

Sheila Keene-Lund is the author of Heaven Is Not the Last Stop, the first book to reconcile a planetary revelation with a wide swath of human knowledge