educational journey

1.2 Your Academic Journey and Personal Story

Questions to Consider:

• How can your academic journey develop skills needed for college success?
• How can your personal story prepare you for applying to college?

Your Academic Journey

Now that you have a better understanding of what college can do for you, it is time to focus on how high school is preparing you for college, or better yet, how you can prepare yourself in high school to become college ready. It is clear that what you do (or don’t do) in high school can affect your ability to get into the colleges of your choice, but there is more to preparing yourself than just earning a high GPA or class rank. Your high school education can provide you with ample opportunity to help you hone your academic skills.

Take Difficult Courses

Any student who is serious about applying to college should consider taking challenging classes while in high school. Why? Because those classes can help lay a foundation of high expectations and hard work and they are often highly regarded by college admissions counselors. These classes are sometimes called Advanced Placement (AP), International Baccalaureate (IB), or honors/advanced classes. If you are considering taking such courses, talk to your guidance counselor or current teachers. They may be able to offer suggestions for how to get selected (if there is an application process) and give you a realistic picture of what will be expected. There is no need to take all AP, IB, or advanced classes to prove you are ready for college, but taking a few can provide a college admissions committee evidence that you are open to challenge.

Manage Time and Tasks

If there is one skill that you can develop now that will help you throughout your college career, it is the ability to manage your time and complete tasks. If you already use a planner to track what you need to do and when it is due , then you are on the right track. You can enhance these skills by setting reminders for yourself—and not relying on teachers or parents to tell you when to complete or submit an assignment. The most important part of managing your time and tasks effectively is to build in time well before something is due to complete the work and to overestimate (at least initially) how long you need, which can provide time “buffers” that will keep you from rushing through work to finish it.

Learn to Learn

Earlier, you were introduced to the argument that the purpose of college is to become a learner. You don’t have to wait until college, though, to figure out how best to learn different subject matters. This is one reason you should consider taking challenging classes–they require that you put more time and effort in them to learn the material. And those skills will make transitioning to college much easier. How can you “learn to learn”? You may have little control over what you are learning and how you are tested, but you can control how you approach the learning. One way to learn how to learn is to space out your learning over time (as best as you can—sometimes teachers like to give you a pop quiz when you least expect it!). Reviewing a bit of material for a short amount of time over several days (as opposed to cramming it in right before a test) produces better results. Another way to learn how to learn is to monitor how well your learning strategies work. Did you do well on a test? Take some time to reflect on what you did that resulted in a good grade. Did you space out your studying? Did you look for connections in the material? Likewise, if you do poorly on a test, determine what led to the result. The more you can identify what works and doesn’t for you, the easier it is to make improvements in your learning strategies.

Demonstrate Integrity and Ownership of Learning

Being a high school student often means having a lot on your plate. It can be easy to put off homework and studying, not do it at all, or cut corners to complete the work. While you may be able to get away with some stumbles like forgetting to turn in an assignment, other behaviors, such as getting someone (including Artificial Intelligence software) to do your homework or write a paper for you can get you into trouble. Now is the time to build the skills you will need later in college. Taking full responsibility for your learning as well as demonstrating integrity in all assignments no matter how big or small are the foundation of those skills. How do you do this? For one, you acknowledge that every action or inaction will produce a result. If you put in the work to write the paper, you will earn the grade you receive. If you do not put in the work or find a way to shortcut the process by using someone else’s writing, then you have missed an opportunity to improve your writing, your thinking, and your project management skills. Plus, you may get into trouble for academic dishonesty, which could mean failing an assignment or a course, or getting a more substantial punishment, such as expulsion. The stakes only get higher when you are in college.

Keep Test Scores in Perspective

You will learn more about standardized test scores and their purpose for getting into college later in this chapter, but it is worth noting that while what you make on the ACT, SAT, or equivalent standardized test, may factor into your ability to get into and pay for the college of your dreams, it is not necessarily a reflection of who you are and what you are capable of. Definitely do all you can to raise your test scores through practicing, prepping, and doing your best on the day of the test. But do not assume that a low test score will be the end of your long-term goals or educational journey. They are just one piece of information by which an institution may evaluate your potential, but it shouldn’t be the only thing that tells who you are.

Your Personal Story

Just as important as your academic journey is your personal story. You will need to develop and reflect on both for your applications to college and scholarships. Those who read about you will want to know not only about your accomplishments, but also your challenges and how you have overcome them.

What Makes You Unique

It may seem cliché to say “There is only one you!” But there is some truth in the fact that you are unique—there is no one else like you. To that end, you may want to draw upon those unique characteristics as you begin to shape the story that you will share with college admissions staff and scholarship committees. Will you be the first in your family to go to college? Do you live on a working farm and feed the goats, cows, and horses every morning before school? Can you ride a unicycle or juggle or both? There may be both personal characteristics as well as experiences that make you stand out from others, and if there are, consider weaving these details into the tapestry of your story. Start by making a list of your characteristics—no trait is too small or typical at this point. You can eliminate items later when you start building your story, but for now, create the list and add to it as you think of new things that you are or can do.

Getting Gritty

Many college essay prompts include an opportunity to share a time in your life in which you faced adversity and overcame it. For some students, this prompt is difficult for they have either not experienced a life-changing setback or not considered themselves challenged. It is important to remember that any setback or disappointment—no matter how inconsequential it may seem to you—can be the basis for an essay that responds to such a prompt. There is no need to embellish the circumstance if it is truly not harrowing, but it is acceptable to frame the experience as something that was difficult for you. Most readers of essays are less looking for a made-for-Hollywood story and more wanting to see someone who has demonstrated tenacity, resilience, and reflection no matter how big or small the adversity is. Even if you are not required to write an essay on a time in your life in which you failed or experienced disappointment, having a story handy for interviews (for scholarships, internships, or jobs) can help you share insight into your personality and strengths in a succinct way.

Finding the Themes of Your Life

In Katharine Brooks’ (2010) book You Majored in What? 3 she shares a writing and reflecting activity called “Wandering Pathways and Butterfly Moments” that guides readers through a series of prompts to develop a list of life experiences for the purpose of discovering what career pathway may be most fruitful for them to pursue. These life experiences could be as monumental as moving to a new state and starting a new school or they can be as mundane as spending the summers fishing. The goal of the exercise is to record what you have done or what has happened to you to get a sense of a “story.” These stories are built upon the connections and themes that you see in the experiences. Here are some of the life experiences Brooks wants you to consider when you are crafting your personal story.

• What have you done during the summer or holiday breaks from school?
• What did you play when you were a young child?
• What are some of your major life experiences (e.g. family events such as births, deaths, marriages, divorces)?
• What do people say you do well or have a talent for or seek you out for?
• What do you consider your greatest achievements?
• What jobs have you had?
• What groups have you belonged to?
• What awards have you won?
• What lessons have you learned?
• What do you like to do for fun?
• What kind of “secret” talent do you have?

The goal of answering the questions is to capture as much about who you are and how you have been shaped to develop clear connections among the life elements and create themes. These themes can drive your personal story that can share on a deeper level who you are or who you are becoming.

Consider this scenario: Raphael has taken the time to write down his life experiences so he can build his personal narrative. Some of the answers to the questions above include the following:

• Raphael’s jobs: lifeguard, babysitter for his nieces and nephews, tutor, art teacher for elementary students
• Raphael’s hobbies and interests: watching old movies, volunteering at the library, creating original jewelry from natural objects
• Raphael’s awards and accolades: he won a writing contest in 11th grade, his friends come to him for advice, he has earned high grades in all of his classes
• Raphael’s major life events: parents divorced when he was 6 years old, he started a new school in junior high, his aunt passed away when he was 14 years old

From this short list, Raphael can begin to draw out themes that he can use to create a detailed picture of who he is. He has found himself in teaching roles with his jobs. He has a love for the arts as evidenced by his hobbies. He is a good communicator evidenced by his awards and accolades, and relationships are an important part of his life. Raphael can use those themes—and details from his experiences—to craft his story as someone who has demonstrated an interest in connecting with and helping others by sharing his expertise and experience.

Recognizing the themes in your life helps you to describe how you've become the person you are now, and helps you to understand who you will become.

"For me, becoming isn't about arriving somewhere or achieving a certain aim. I see it instead as forward motion, a means of evolving, a way to reach continuously toward a better self. The journey doesn't end" —former First Lady Michelle Obama , Becoming (2018)

Analysis Question

In what ways is your academic journey in high school shaping your personal narrative? Describe how the following experiences are helping you “become":

• The classes that you are taking
• The activities you participate in as part of school (e.g., sports, performing arts, etc.)
• The learning that you are doing outside of school (e.g., community language class)

In what ways are your personal experiences shaping your story? Describe how the following experiences are helping you “become”:

• Major life events
• Favorite activities
• Awards and accomplishments
• Jobs or volunteer work
• 3 Brooks, K.(2010). You majored in what? Plume.

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The Importance of a Learning Journey

The pursuit of knowledge has the power to transform us. A learning journey nurtures this curiosity of transformation in the learners. It offers continued learning and ensures continued growth. It uses tools that can also help learners navigate the terrain to keep learners going. One can use a it to discover what to learn, how to learn, and what they are good at. Once they understand this, they can easily use the tools and techniques provided by a learning journey to improve their knowledge.

Table of Contents

What is a learning journey, why is a learning journey important, how do you create a learning journey, how to implement it, benefits of the learning journey, infographic, knowledge check , frequently asked questions (faqs), what is the learning journey, what is an employee learning journey.

The term learning journey refers to a planned learning experience that takes place over time and includes various learning aspects and experiences using multiple techniques and platforms. Instructional designers create a learning journey to identify the appropriate format and methodology of learning. A well-structured learning journey can help the learners to achieve the objectives effectively, ensure learning implementation, and initiate actual behavioral change .

It caters to the leadership style, culture, specific needs of any organization , and the preferences of the learner’s leadership level. It also shows a more straightforward path to the learners’ learning goals, demonstrating a starting point and structured progress to help them achieve the objectives effectively. Organizations take the help of a learning journey to navigate their employees into a well-structured training process.

Organizations that employ a mixed learning journey are 2.5 times more likely to be financially successful than those that use more conventional learning approaches. (Source: DDI, Global Leadership Forecast).

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Learners find the structure provided by the learning journey very helpful. It clarifies what people should do next and how much time they should set aside. It offers a high level of flexibility around where and when they should study, together with the multiple modes and channels for learning, which help embed essential skills rapidly and effectively.

The knowledge, study, and research abilities that learners bring to the learning process make up their learning journey. Since instructors are involved in designing and evaluating their education, it also offers a structural method to the learners and the instructors who are shaping the module. Instructional designers create a well-aligned learning module using a it.

In order to create a successful learning journey that is well-aligned with the organization, instructional designers try to:

• Bring attention to the prospects for learning:  The goal can only be achievable when the learners understand why this learning is essential. Only then can the organizations promote a healthy learning environment .
• Describe the benefits for the employees: Adult learners are encouraged intrinsically with self-esteem, desire for a better quality of life, self-development, and recognition. Therefore, instructors must plan a well-aligned learning journey according to that.
• Use gamification , virtual and augmented reality, scenario-based learning, and branching scenarios like immersive formal learning. The effectiveness of immersive learning has been demonstrated, with assignments finished on schedule. As a result, compared to other conventional learning approaches , this style of education has a higher likelihood of producing successful results. Immersive learners always develop more extraordinary cognitive abilities than traditional learners. They exhibit better problem-solving skills, better memory, and higher attention control.
• Provide employees with access to information during work so, they know what they need when needed.
• Support formal events with performance support tools.
• Reinforce learning by providing opportunities for practice, follow-up tools, and constructive criticism.
• Offer social learning so learners can interact with those who are also learning and advancing while exchanging information and experiences. As adult learners, they are instrumental in their learning process. They are more proactive in doing the work needed to facilitate learning and drive the learning process based on what they think they have to succeed on the job . Learners bring a greater volume, quality of experience, and rich resources to one another.

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Instructional designers can implement it like this:

• First, they should assess the employees’ current skill levels based on the organization’s competency model. Finding and concentrating on the essential leadership skill gaps is the first step in a precise diagnosis.
• Then, learning should be applied and tested through computer-based business simulations customized to the organization’s specific needs. Simulation exercises ensure that concepts learned during the learning event apply to the organization’s real-world issues.
• Next, they can use follow-up tools to support continuing learning with additional content, case studies , and community leader boards to encourage the new learners. It utilizes several measurement techniques to quantify the effectiveness of the talent development program.

It has the following advantages:

• It helps the learners to navigate appropriately. It helps them to gain knowledge independently.
• A well-aligned learning journey brings additional structure to a learning system. It provides a structured environment that helps to maintain discipline in the learning process.
• It enables self-paced learning for the learners. It generates an individualized experience. It helps learners undertake the courses at their own pace, according to their needs. It gives the learners freedom in their choices.
• It makes it easier to define and pursue goals. It generates an achievable goal for the learners and motivates them to achieve it.
• It helps accelerate the learning and development goals of the employees as well as of the organizations.
• It saves admin time.
• It promotes a continuous feedback method that reevaluates the purpose of the journey.
• It makes learning a continuous process, a journey indeed.
• It offers to learn in small chunks. Small amounts are better for retention. It allows learners to remember and relearn the materials at their convenience.

Learning Journey

• To allow learners a competitive edge.
• To provide structured learning experience.
• To offer creativity.
• To make feedback more immediate.
• Finding and concentrating on the essential skill gaps in the organization.
• Communicating with the employees/stakeholders.
• Imposing a general training and development journey.

With the help of a learning journey, one can evaluate a learner’s progress, clarifying what they should accomplish next and how much time they should allot for it. Learners’ ability to self-evaluate their learning progress makes the learning process independent. Employee learning journeys consist of a number of distinct learning experiences that are spread out over time, utilizing various methods and delivery modalities and leading to the acquisition of new knowledge, skills, or behavioral changes at the end of the journey.

The term learning journey refers to a planned learning experience that takes place over time and includes various learning aspects and experiences using multiple techniques and platforms.

In order to create a successful learning journey that is well-aligned with the organization, instructional designers always keep the end goal in mind, recognize the gaps, extend learning over development-related activities, involve the learners to direct management, calculate the effects, and plan for flawless execution.

With the help of learning journeys, one can evaluate a learner’s progress, clarifying what they should accomplish next and how much time they should allot for it.

Employee learning journeys consist of a number of distinct learning experiences that are spread out over time, utilizing various methods and delivery modalities and leading to the acquisition of new knowledge, skills, or behavioral changes at the end of the journey.

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The Best Way to Master a New Skill? Try This Creative Approach.

• Sarah Stein Greenberg

Use this tool to discover your strengths and identify challenge areas.

Becoming skilled at tackling anything means going on a journey of highs and lows. Both extremes provide important feedback that lets you know where you are in the learning process. Most of us know how to interpret the high of a big new idea, but fewer of us have the tools to make sense of the harder moments, when we’re struggling to understand a concept. We forget that discomfort is an essential part of discovery. In those moments, how do you get “unstuck” and navigate your way forward?

• The Learning Journey Map is one tool you can use to chart your learning experience over time and identify the moments when you soared effortlessly and when you ran into challenges.
• It helps you take something that’s usually internal and invisible — your own learning — and bring it outside yourself, where you can examine it more objectively, discover your strengths, and identify and work through your challenge areas.
• The next time you’re struggling with a learning opportunity, use the worksheet in this article to give it a try.

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You may have graduated college, but your days of being a student are far from over. Throughout your career (whether you earned a degree last year or last century) you will face many situations that call for learning — it’s just that, now, there’s no syllabus or exams.

• SG Sarah Stein Greenberg is the executive director of the Stanford d.school. She leads a community of designers, faculty, and other innovative thinkers who help people unlock their creative abilities and apply them to the world. Her new book is   Creative Acts for Curious People: How to Think, Create, and Lead in Unconventional Ways.

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What Is Education For?

Read an excerpt from a new book by Sir Ken Robinson and Kate Robinson, which calls for redesigning education for the future.

What is education for? As it happens, people differ sharply on this question. It is what is known as an “essentially contested concept.” Like “democracy” and “justice,” “education” means different things to different people. Various factors can contribute to a person’s understanding of the purpose of education, including their background and circumstances. It is also inflected by how they view related issues such as ethnicity, gender, and social class. Still, not having an agreed-upon definition of education doesn’t mean we can’t discuss it or do anything about it.

We just need to be clear on terms. There are a few terms that are often confused or used interchangeably—“learning,” “education,” “training,” and “school”—but there are important differences between them. Learning is the process of acquiring new skills and understanding. Education is an organized system of learning. Training is a type of education that is focused on learning specific skills. A school is a community of learners: a group that comes together to learn with and from each other. It is vital that we differentiate these terms: children love to learn, they do it naturally; many have a hard time with education, and some have big problems with school.

There are many assumptions of compulsory education. One is that young people need to know, understand, and be able to do certain things that they most likely would not if they were left to their own devices. What these things are and how best to ensure students learn them are complicated and often controversial issues. Another assumption is that compulsory education is a preparation for what will come afterward, like getting a good job or going on to higher education.

So, what does it mean to be educated now? Well, I believe that education should expand our consciousness, capabilities, sensitivities, and cultural understanding. It should enlarge our worldview. As we all live in two worlds—the world within you that exists only because you do, and the world around you—the core purpose of education is to enable students to understand both worlds. In today’s climate, there is also a new and urgent challenge: to provide forms of education that engage young people with the global-economic issues of environmental well-being.

This core purpose of education can be broken down into four basic purposes.

Education should enable young people to engage with the world within them as well as the world around them. In Western cultures, there is a firm distinction between the two worlds, between thinking and feeling, objectivity and subjectivity. This distinction is misguided. There is a deep correlation between our experience of the world around us and how we feel. As we explored in the previous chapters, all individuals have unique strengths and weaknesses, outlooks and personalities. Students do not come in standard physical shapes, nor do their abilities and personalities. They all have their own aptitudes and dispositions and different ways of understanding things. Education is therefore deeply personal. It is about cultivating the minds and hearts of living people. Engaging them as individuals is at the heart of raising achievement.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights emphasizes that “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights,” and that “Education shall be directed to the full development of the human personality and to the strengthening of respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms.” Many of the deepest problems in current systems of education result from losing sight of this basic principle.

Schools should enable students to understand their own cultures and to respect the diversity of others. There are various definitions of culture, but in this context the most appropriate is “the values and forms of behavior that characterize different social groups.” To put it more bluntly, it is “the way we do things around here.” Education is one of the ways that communities pass on their values from one generation to the next. For some, education is a way of preserving a culture against outside influences. For others, it is a way of promoting cultural tolerance. As the world becomes more crowded and connected, it is becoming more complex culturally. Living respectfully with diversity is not just an ethical choice, it is a practical imperative.

There should be three cultural priorities for schools: to help students understand their own cultures, to understand other cultures, and to promote a sense of cultural tolerance and coexistence. The lives of all communities can be hugely enriched by celebrating their own cultures and the practices and traditions of other cultures.

Education should enable students to become economically responsible and independent. This is one of the reasons governments take such a keen interest in education: they know that an educated workforce is essential to creating economic prosperity. Leaders of the Industrial Revolution knew that education was critical to creating the types of workforce they required, too. But the world of work has changed so profoundly since then, and continues to do so at an ever-quickening pace. We know that many of the jobs of previous decades are disappearing and being rapidly replaced by contemporary counterparts. It is almost impossible to predict the direction of advancing technologies, and where they will take us.

How can schools prepare students to navigate this ever-changing economic landscape? They must connect students with their unique talents and interests, dissolve the division between academic and vocational programs, and foster practical partnerships between schools and the world of work, so that young people can experience working environments as part of their education, not simply when it is time for them to enter the labor market.

Education should enable young people to become active and compassionate citizens. We live in densely woven social systems. The benefits we derive from them depend on our working together to sustain them. The empowerment of individuals has to be balanced by practicing the values and responsibilities of collective life, and of democracy in particular. Our freedoms in democratic societies are not automatic. They come from centuries of struggle against tyranny and autocracy and those who foment sectarianism, hatred, and fear. Those struggles are far from over. As John Dewey observed, “Democracy has to be born anew every generation, and education is its midwife.”

For a democratic society to function, it depends upon the majority of its people to be active within the democratic process. In many democracies, this is increasingly not the case. Schools should engage students in becoming active, and proactive, democratic participants. An academic civics course will scratch the surface, but to nurture a deeply rooted respect for democracy, it is essential to give young people real-life democratic experiences long before they come of age to vote.

Eight Core Competencies

The conventional curriculum is based on a collection of separate subjects. These are prioritized according to beliefs around the limited understanding of intelligence we discussed in the previous chapter, as well as what is deemed to be important later in life. The idea of “subjects” suggests that each subject, whether mathematics, science, art, or language, stands completely separate from all the other subjects. This is problematic. Mathematics, for example, is not defined only by propositional knowledge; it is a combination of types of knowledge, including concepts, processes, and methods as well as propositional knowledge. This is also true of science, art, and languages, and of all other subjects. It is therefore much more useful to focus on the concept of disciplines rather than subjects.

Disciplines are fluid; they constantly merge and collaborate. In focusing on disciplines rather than subjects we can also explore the concept of interdisciplinary learning. This is a much more holistic approach that mirrors real life more closely—it is rare that activities outside of school are as clearly segregated as conventional curriculums suggest. A journalist writing an article, for example, must be able to call upon skills of conversation, deductive reasoning, literacy, and social sciences. A surgeon must understand the academic concept of the patient’s condition, as well as the practical application of the appropriate procedure. At least, we would certainly hope this is the case should we find ourselves being wheeled into surgery.

The concept of disciplines brings us to a better starting point when planning the curriculum, which is to ask what students should know and be able to do as a result of their education. The four purposes above suggest eight core competencies that, if properly integrated into education, will equip students who leave school to engage in the economic, cultural, social, and personal challenges they will inevitably face in their lives. These competencies are curiosity, creativity, criticism, communication, collaboration, compassion, composure, and citizenship. Rather than be triggered by age, they should be interwoven from the beginning of a student’s educational journey and nurtured throughout.

From Imagine If: Creating a Future for Us All by Sir Ken Robinson, Ph.D and Kate Robinson, published by Penguin Books, an imprint of Penguin Publishing Group, a division of Penguin Random House, LLC. Copyright © 2022 by the Estate of Sir Kenneth Robinson and Kate Robinson.

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7 tips to help you achieve academic success

What is academic success?

Academic success means different things to different people. Whether you want to explore a subject area that you’re passionate about or enhance your credentials to advance your career, one of the primary purposes of education is to help you reach your full personal and professional potential. To achieve your vision for success, it’s important to create clear, actionable objectives and develop good habits and skills to guide your learning and keep you on track in your studies.

How do you achieve academic success?

Setting achievable short- and long-term goals is one key to academic success. When you set actionable objectives and incorporate skills and behaviors like time management, good study habits, and resilience, it’s easier to create and execute an effective study plan, track your progress, and reach your milestones. If you’re unsure of where to start when it comes to making a plan, read on to explore seven tips you can implement to align with your unique needs and experiences.

1. Work on your time management skills

One of the most critical skills for academic success is effective management of your study time. Time management skills are essential because they help ensure you stay on top of all your readings, projects, and exams. Managing your time well also requires you to stay organized, prioritize your tasks, and plan out a daily, weekly, and monthly study schedule that you stick to. How you choose to manage your study calendar is up to you, but you should create a system to track your project deadlines, exams, and study sessions in a way that’s easily accessible—whether that be a time management app on your phone, an online daily planner, or a physical calendar. As long as you carve out specific amounts of time each day or week to ensure you accomplish your high-priority items, you will set yourself up for success. It can also be helpful to let the important people in your life know about the times you have reserved for your studies so you can avoid distractions and stay focused on the tasks at hand.

2. Set small goals to help you accomplish large goals

One of the best ways to help you meet your larger, long-term goals is by tackling smaller goals that will help you achieve the results you desire. Create SMART goals that are clear and realistic and use your resources and time productively. SMART is an acronym that stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound. By setting SMART goals, you give yourself the opportunity to take a hard look at your objectives, understand what is motivating them, and pinpoint the actions you need to take to meet them. An example of a SMART academic goal is, “I will work to improve my grade from a B to an A by devoting four hours a week to studying my notes, readings, and flashcards for the next three weeks.”

3. Surround yourself with supportive people who motivate you

When you lean on people who support your educational journey, it can invigorate you and help stoke your determination. With family, friends, and coworkers, it’s important to open up about your experience of returning to university to enhance your skills—including both your accomplishments and your challenges. It can also be helpful to share with your instructors and peers at Penn LPS Online. Because your coursework includes group projects, presentations, and online discussions, you’ll have many opportunities to collaborate with your classmates, share your experiences, and help each other to excel in your studies. And you’ll also interact with Ivy League faculty and practitioners who are experts in their fields who will be more than willing to support you by addressing any questions or concerns you may have.

4. Build good study habits

Developing and maintaining good study habits is critical to your academic success. When you make good study habits a part of your daily routine, it can increase your efficiency, confidence, and effectiveness while reducing anxiety about your coursework. The reality is that your days are likely already packed with work, family, and other personal responsibilities, so it’s crucial you carve out time to devote to studying. To help you build strong study habits, it’s beneficial to create a consistent and structured daily plan. Ensure that you have a dedicated environment that is conducive to studying and avoid procrastination by holding yourself accountable to your dedicated study sessions. These tips can help:

• Take effective notes when listening to lectures or reading course materials Taking effective notes is extremely helpful for understanding course material and completing assignments—and there is a definite strategy for doing so. First, be selective and pay attention to the concepts that your instructor indicates are important—and look for section headings or summaries in your readings that highlight essential material. Then, once you’ve identified major concepts, rewrite them in your own words to help make them more understandable and memorable. Finally, go back and recap each idea in one or two sentences to streamline and highlight key takeaways.
• Create mind maps A mind map is a diagram that represents how various ideas relate to the main concept. Using mind maps can be an effective way of organizing and summarizing key concepts, particularly if you’re a visual learner. Start by writing the central concept in the middle of your page and then draw curved lines branching out with related ideas. Then, you can add branches to the related ideas with further points. You can also use different colors, pictures, and line lengths/widths to make your maps more memorable or highlight the most important concepts.
• Break up study sessions While some long study sessions can’t be avoided, if you can break up your study time into shorter increments, you will be doing yourself a favor. That’s because your brain needs these breaks to process and store the information that you learn. And stopping to grab a snack, listen to a podcast, or grab coffee with a friend can help you relax, improve your mood, and allow you to focus better once you return to studying.

5. Develop your patience and resilience

In a world where our attention spans seem to be getting shorter and instant gratification is often celebrated, it can be difficult to cultivate patience. But if you want to be successful in reaching your academic goals, you’re going to have to learn how. Practices that can be helpful to overcome impatience include being more mindful of your reactions to your environment, calming your mind by practicing deep breathing or meditation, and rewarding yourself when you reach set milestones.

Resilience refers to your ability to adapt to and overcome life’s challenges. If you’re interested in learning more about how to become more resilient you should look into APOP 1200: Human Flourishing: Strengths and Resilience at Penn LPS Online. This course explores the science of positive psychology and how we can leverage our strengths to contribute to the greater world and enhance our personal well-being. You will also learn about the physical and psychological protective principles and factors that comprise resilience and how they can be nurtured to help you flourish in your academics, career, and personal life.

6. Take care of yourself physically and mentally

You can’t expect to meet your goals if you experience burnout. That’s why it’s so important that you take care of your physical and mental health. Some effective ways to take care of your body include eating a well-balanced and nutritious diet and exercising regularly. Remember that being active doesn’t have to involve going to the gym—it can also be taking a dance class, going for a bike ride, or walking your dog around the neighborhood. The endorphins that your body produces when you exercise can help improve your disposition and relax your mind. You should also prioritize sleep to help boost your immune system, reduce stress, and increase your ability to focus on your studies. Did you know getting outdoors can improve your mental health? Not only will you enjoy the fresh air, but exposure to sunlight is also believed to increase the release of serotonin, a hormone associated with improved mood and sense of calm and concentration.

 Finally, schedule time just for fun! Whether you engage in your favorite hobby, work on a creative project, or go out to dinner with your partner, when you make the time to do activities that you love, it benefits your well-being and ultimately increases your chances of academic success. And it’s important to note that if you do find yourself feeling overwhelmed or struggling mentally during your studies that reaching out to a professional therapist is always a healthy step to take.

7. Practice positive thinking

People who maintain a positive outlook on life may cope better with stress, have stronger immunity, and experience healthier and happier lives. Consequently, cultivating a positive mindset can be invaluable when it comes to learning. Positive psychology is the scientific study of what helps people to thrive in all aspects of their lives. In APOP 1000: Introduction to Positive Psychology at Penn LPS Online, you will explore the underpinnings of positive psychology, address questions surrounding what it means to be happy, and learn the theory and science that supports the conceptual framework of well-being. With hands-on experiments and group activities, you’ll discover how to build well-being in yourself, in organizations, and in communities. So, when you’re registering for courses, do yourself a favor and consider this one.

Are you ready to achieve academic success?

Congratulations on committing to continuing your education and furthering your personal and professional development. In addition to advancing your academic and career goals, lifelong learning can also help you improve your self-confidence and self-worth, renew your creativity and motivation, build soft skills such as critical thinking and adaptability, and enhance your overall quality of life.

The Ivy League courses , certificates , and degree at Penn LPS Online are designed with adult learners like you in mind, offering the flexibility to obtain new career skills, indulge your unique passions, or earn your liberal arts degree on a schedule that works with your busy life. At Penn LPS Online, you can pursue your academic goals while building a foundation grounded in the arts and sciences and broadening your professional prospects.

View our course guide to see what excites you! Enrollment for certificates and courses and applications for the Bachelor of Applied Arts and Sciences program are always open. Visit our online application and get started today!

The Learning Experience Journey Map

A learning experience journey map is a visual tool that highlights key phases in a learner’s journey. It also helps identify learning outcomes and learner emotions, facilitating more effective content creation. Explore our journey map to enhance learning experiences and empower students.

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Eager to enhance learner engagement and create more meaningful educational experiences? Uncover the potential of a learning experience journey map to better understand your learners and elevate their learning journey!

A learning experience journey map is a visual representation that outlines the various stages a learner goes through while engaging with a learning experience. It also helps educators and designers identify learners’ needs, emotions, and pain points at each stage, enabling the creation of more effective and engaging learning experiences. By illustrating the learner’s journey, we can optimize delivery, increase engagement, and ultimately boost knowledge acquisition and skill development.

Discover how it can transform your approach and help learners thrive.

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This tool is available as a PDF. (Google Docs, Mural.co, Miro.com, and Notion.so formats are under development.)

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License and attribution

The LEAD Toolkit and all of its tools are made available for non-commercial use through the Creative Commons License  summarized and linked from here . If you would like to use the tools in different ways, please be in touch .

Please attribute this tool as follows:

“The Learning Experience Journey Map.” Extraordinary Experience Lab’s LEAD Toolkit, https://extraordinaryexperiencelab.org/tools/the-heroic-learner. Accessed Month Day, Year.

Version 1.0

• 2023-03-29: Initial release in the Extraordinary Experience Lab’s LEAD Toolkit, developed and pre-tested by Kristi Ivan and Matt Rogers Draycott

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What is a "Learning Journey Roadmap?" and How to Implement One in Your Course or Program

By Karen Velasquez, Director of Experiential Learning

Students participate in many different courses, programs, activities, and experiential learning experiences during their time at UD. They are asked to connect the dots among these experiences when it comes time to write a cover letter for an employer or complete a reflection assignment in a capstone course, for example. I wondered what would happen if I we asked students to visualize their educational journeys on paper in the form a “roadmap?”  As an anthropologist of education interested in how people represent their learning experiences in diverse ways, I wanted to find a different medium for students to creatively express their unique stories (beyond text or oral history formats).

As part of our monthly Experiential Learning Lab workshops, The Office of Experiential Learning (OEL) asked over a dozen students from different majors and backgrounds to draw out their learning journeys in the form of personal roadmaps to illustrate key learning moments they’ve had along the way. Students use markers, colored pencils, and a large piece of paper to visually represent their unique path through college. They write down key courses and programs they’ve participated in, as well as the skills and lessons they’ve learned through those experiences, which led them to next steps in their personal journey. (See roadmap gallery below)

Students were also asked to write a text narrative as an accompaniment to their roadmaps. After drawing and writing, students were asked to share their roadmaps and narratives with peers and OEL student employees, which resulted in deep and meaningful dialogue. I implemented this activity in EL Lab workshops with students from different majors and backgrounds, who were at different stages in their college journey (sophomores through seniors, mostly). The roadmap activity was also adopted by an instructor from the Office of Learning Resources, in his course for students on academic probation.

Key findings from the learning journey roadmaps:

• Catching student at different stages of their development is a beneficial learning experience. We can ask students to return to an earlier roadmap and reflect on what they drew in the past, to see how they have grown and transformed over time.
• Students enjoy having a map of their experiences on paper; most remarked that they had never seen their educational journey displayed in such a way.
• Time to reflect and engage the senses through drawing activities such as this one are beneficial particularly for busy students who may not take the time out of their normal daily schedules to take a step back and appreciate all they have accomplished.
• We can see how individuals learn in diverse ways. Sometimes they get involved in activities through friends, or are encouraged by their professors and other mentors. Through these roadmaps we gain an appreciation of the often spontaneous or unplanned moments of learning which are unique to each student and which can result in drastic changes in direction.
• Prompting students to include challenging moments can also be beneficial for learning. Sometimes we skip over the difficult times instead of taking a moment to think about what we learned from those challenges, and how they’ve shaped us.

Students are not the only ones who may benefit from creating a visual representation of their journeys.  We know that the process of finding our path(s) can be a lifelong one, and we continue to learn how to navigate different opportunities and challenges well beyond college years. These roadmaps can help us understand the choices we’ve made in more tangible ways, and highlight the realizations we’ve had through our vocational journeys.

To see the full learning journey roadmap and roadmap narrative instructions click here>>.

For more examples of student roadmaps and narratives click here>>.

For a video illustration of students drawing and explaining their roadmaps, see Sophia Williamson’s roadmap here>> and Christopher Miller’s roadmap YouTube video here>> .

• Experiential Learning

I Interviewed Over 20 Faculty About EL and Here’s What They Had to Say.

Experiential learning academic catalog 2019-2020.