Procrastinators Anonymous

I’m going to tell you one of the main reasons college students fail. Nah, I’ll just tell you later after I watch one more movie. Or after I play one more match. Or after I go to this last party. I’ll tell you eventually. Yup, its procrastination; and its one of the most dangerous things to a college kid’s scores.

I am a procrastinator. If there was a support group for procrastinators, I’d have been forced to sign up long ago. Something like, Procrastinators Anonymous- We’ll Help You Eventually. All throughout high school I struggled to care enough about my studies to get things done in a timely manner. I’d shove assignments in my backpack, forget about them until the day they were due, then I’d quickly scribble some semblance of an answer and hastily turn it in. I was not alone in this trend of procrastination. This is a normal thing in school; to place other things before one’s work and keep pushing it off until the last minute.

Once during my senior year I did an entire research paper for my college level dual credit class in 4 days. That’s nothing compared to several of my fellow classmates who did the entire thing the night before and received appropriately poor grades to accompany their procrastination. I’ve witnessed this in college too. Fellow classmates go into a flurry of action as they attempt to finish work before class begins or the professor arrives. If anything, I believe the gentle pull to procrastinate is stronger in college, thanks to the huge amount of freedom students have. Imagine this choice for the average college student. Would you like to either study geography or go hang with friends? Or play the latest video game? Or go work out? Or go party? The decision is hard when all you want to do is not read about geography anymore.

So, what’s the cure for procrastination? Failure. From my personal experiences, the best way to convince someone to stop procrastinating is to let them just go ahead and put off studying.  After they are handed back the failing grade they earned they’ll suddenly realize studying geography doesn’t seem like such a bad option. I imagine that’s exactly how Procrastinators Anonymous would help students as well. By doing absolutely nothing to stop them from procrastinating. Then, after students fail a few exams, they’d tell the students the super duper secret, Area 51 level classified information about procrastinating. Its all about self control. In the end, its up to the college student to buckle down and do their work on time, its an obvious truth, but one that can take a few failed exams to sink in. But of course Procrastinators Anonymous will only tell you all of this after 8 meetings – there’s a party to go to first.