Key to success for online education or the classroom

It is not uncommon to hear students agonizing over their college or university studies. "Oh, it's so hard!" "It's very tough!" some will pre-warn new students.

From my experience, either online or in the classroom, discipline is 50% of success. Many students are horribly undisciplined. If you look around the classroom, you'll know immediately who they are. They'll be missing class, coming in late, handing in late assignments, not doing their assigned readings, waiting until the last minute to start working on assignments, chatting on MSN on their laptops during lectures, and the list goes on and on. Some of them will also be suffering from hangovers.

For online courses, they are the ones who forget about assignments, continue to chat with friends while watching/listening to online lectures, and leave the readings for the last minute. You just can't absorb chapters upon chapters of information or intensive lectures in a couple of hours.

It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that doing all of the above affects one's grade and success. That is why I say discipline is half of success. Be disciplined and do everything you're supposed to, and the other 50% (or most of it anyway) will come by itself.

To be fair though, I will say that there are times when one just does not understand the subject matter, and that problem could be magnified if it's an online course and the instructor is not readily available. Yes, it does happen but it's the exception rather than the rule.

Never underestimate the influence your being attentive and punctual can have on your instructor. Professors are humans, after all, and they are influenced by factors otherthan the quality of one's paper or exam answers.

Those who think they're smart and try to outwit the system dupe themselves, especially when they're paying for the very stuff they're not paying attention to.

Heck, if they can't even figure that out...it's no wonder they think the study material is so hard!