Set the Tone – Building Your College Routine
By Gabe Dickerson
Fall 2025
College can be one of the largest changes and challenges you have faced up to this point in your life. Making time to balance your classes, meeting people, self-care, and parties can be difficult while they are all competing for your time and attention. Starting off, you may feel great and excited about your “new life” but maintaining that is where the challenges may come about. Avoiding burnout, procrastination, and a feeling of being overwhelmed can pile up fast, but creating a routine isn’t just helpful but is essential.
A structured routine can allow you to manage your time to make your classes, find time to see your friends while making sure you are taking care of yourself! The University of Cincinnati states that starting small is better than not starting at all and the best way to do this is improving time management. Effective time management helps maintain a healthier lifestyle of your life responsibilities.
As someone who struggled to get the ropes under control in college at first, I had to find a way that works for me. If you want to hit the ground running and are someone who may struggle or is nervous about school, starting this article about schedule and routine may be perfect for your start at college.
Why Routines Matter
Transitioning into the college atmosphere can be a substantial shift in your young adult life. With the absence of parents and connections with each teacher, you manage your schedule and daily structure independently. This freedom can be great but can also lead quickly to chaos. An example that may be overlooked would be parents giving reminders to do homework and asking about how school is going, that are questions/reminders you may miss in college.
Controlling chaos is very attainable and important for your mental health. The American Psychological Association explains the transition colleges are making on their own campus regarding mental health and student workload. Colleges understand the pressure and the amount of work that students have. The article does a great job showing how colleges are adjusting.
That right there shows the importance of routine. Being able to manage your workload while still making the most of your time at college is necessary. Scott H Young has a great chart balancing your life style. about balancing your lifestyle. Making time for what you love and making time for what you should do needs to take place.
Consistency is Key
Consistency regulates the brain; it makes the irregular at the start feel more normal. Making those sacrifices for not only your mental health but also your physical health is necessary. Benefits of friendships can go on for days but going out of your way to make time is impactful. The Mayo Clinic does a fabulous job promoting friendships and the importance of being a friend that reaches out. Post University says physical exercise can be just as effective as studying. The correlation between physical performance and academic performance is much stronger than most initially would assume. Building physical activity into your daily life is powerful.
How to Build Your College Routine
When building a routine, don’t make it complicated! There are two main objectives, identify your priorities while finding a rhythm that aligns with them. You can’t be perfect, don’t try to be. Design a routine around what will be most effective to see progress in your life.
Step 1: Identify your key priorities
Find three things that are part of your daily life that you care about. Common priorities among college students are mental health, relationships, and academics, but there is a large range because we are all different.Mental Health First Aid mentions that avoiding social isolation, eating healthy and taking care of your physical well-being should be the priority.
Step 2: Plan out a usual week
Start by writing down your weekly schedule. This may include class times, work schedules, and other weekly essentials. Next, it is a great time to fill in your schedule with flexible activities. Whether that is studying, taking a long walk, playing sports with your friends, or watching your favorite tv show. Using an effective calendar makes this very simple and straight forward. There are reasons to get a calendar; It helps to reduce stress and improve awareness among other things, says S.P. Richards. A calendar is also a great physical element to help our busy brains, with a physical piece that doesn’t forget our lengthy laundry list.
Step 3: Create a morning routine
Starting your day in a positive way sets the stage for the rest of the day. Waking up at a consistent time after a seven-or eight-hour nights rest and then attacking the day after doing what you need to do instead of “doom-scrolling.” Take some time for gratitude that builds momentum into the rest of each day!
Step 4: Establish studying
Finding a productive studying method maximizes your productivity. Locating a trend in your days to consistently have time to study so your brain can regulate your study habits also maximizes your productivity.
Step 5: Rest and enjoy your time
Routines are not restrictions; you should have space to go and enjoy your time! A great routine does a phenomenal job balancing responsibilities with rewards. Find what those responsibilities are daily and attack them so you can enjoy doing what you love!
Common Obstacles in College
College is full of endless opportunities, and with opportunities comes a struggle to feel like you must keep up with it all and not fall behind. You are not required to say yes to everything and/or everyone; it's alright to say no, be kind and thoughtful but know what is best for you.
Overcommitment is draining and can quickly transform into burnout. Burnout results in a feeling of mental exhaustion. Pushing a to-do list off till the last minute continuously is procrastination, and that is an obstacle you want to avoid. You don’t want repeated procrastination to turn into a trend. Overwhelmed can feel like the entirety of the world is falling in on you. Kelci Lynn Lucifer mentions tactics that can limit the amount of stress and anxiety that the overwhelmed feeling can create.
Impact on Academic Performance
This can be an unbelievable time of your life; there is so much new going on around you including the level of academics. The change of atmosphere inside and outside of the classroom can do a lot for students. I was lucky enough to sit down with Linh Phu, a Student Success Coach at North Central College, and I was able to ask a handful of important questions. Mrs. Phu emphasized how college students' confidence often shakes due to the level in academic jumps, not that it's too hard for them, but their past academics may not have shown them the time commitment needed to succeed. Linh also added two key insights; students tend to come to their “team” offices at the beginning of the semester because of the struggle with time management. Finding a system that “works for you” was one of Linh’s points of emphasis as a recommendation to college students.
Take these points into consideration from someone who has first-hand experience with college students who have a little rough patch. Doing what is best for you, and doing what is best for your success is what's necessary for building a great rhythm to your college life.
Finding a productive studying method maximizes your productivity. Locating a trend in your days to consistently have time to study so your brain can regulate your study habits also maximizes your productivity.
The Importance of Balance
I am going to repeat that balancing a healthy lifestyle is a key to success. Balance creates symmetry. Balance prevents and enhances aspects of your life you may or may not see coming. Only focusing on school isn’t for everyone; instead, searching for fun and spontaneous activities that bring you joy.
A schedule with routines is not restrictions on your life; they are guidelines. Take bowling for example, you start your bowling journey, you may be using the guidelines, the "bumpers.” The bumpers don’t restrict you from rolling a strike; instead, they make it easier. Just as a routine may make your life a tad bit easier.
Balance will take time; there is no magic solution, but trying and failing will help you figure out what's right for you. It may take time to figure out what that is, but without defining different opportunities and options it may be what's necessary for you to figure out what's needed.
Perfection is Irrelevant
The “perfect plan” will never happen due to all the moving elements in your life. College is very unpredictable; there are many ups and downs that you may not see coming. You should never attempt to “stay on script” because that's not what the routine does for you. Staying on routines with morning and night can be more than helpful, but I understand that you may not always be able to do so. Some days may not go as planned, and that is perfectly ok. There isn't a perfect system that is going to go great every single day, and what is what makes college so exciting!
When to Adjust your Routine
This can be hard to locate when it may be time, but there are a few points that may jump out. Plateaus are very common. When starting something new you may see great results at first but then all of a sudden you may feel like progress has completely halted. A plateau is when you reach a high point, but you level out; you want to continue to strive for upward progress.
The Healthpub explains the plateau in your workout routine. You can apply this concept to more than just your workouts, if you continue to do the same thing and it stops improving it may be time to change it up. You may feel like you’ve hit a wall, and that is alright; it may be time to adjust. Don’t freak out, it will happen, just take a step back and remember your priorities and stay in a rhythm.
Build it Towards YOU
One of my lifelong friends is Bailey Sniadecki. He is a college student at the University of Missouri, and he is studying finance. I was able to call Bailey and have a 20-minute conversation about his experiences in college as someone who struggles with ADD and time management. (trust me, I would know!)
Mr. Sniadecki says that the start of college was a real struggle because his organizational skills weren’t where they needed to be. He states that the absence of his parents made a huge difference because nobody was “breathing down his neck” to make sure he was doing what he needed. After struggling for a little while he then switched to using his outlook calendar on his phone, he says this makes the largest difference for him because of the notifications that it provides. He often forgot to take his pills that would lead to more issues. One of the main issues that would spiral with the unorganized era of college was his grades. The homework completion rate was terrible, and I just constantly forgot to attack the homework which then would result in poor grades.
It is all different for each person, if it was easy enough to just get handed a schedule and a daily routine you would be given that but instead you would have to make it your own. The way you want to handle situations, do the things you love, and how to attack problems.
Conclusion
Make the most of your time at college! Use the guidelines, use the resources around you, but also remember, have fun! The best way to enjoy your time at college is to not fall behind and avoid those feelings that I stated above. Finding it early and adjusting it to what fits you will benefit you most.
A healthy, consistent routine builds structure, reduces stress, and prepares you for this thing called life. A routine and schedule aren’t there to limit you or keep you from venturing out, but they are there to assist you. It’s there to make your college time a little less stressful and make it the best time of your young life!
Gabe Dickerson is a Junior at North Central College, pursuing a Bachelors in Sport Management and Digital Marketing Minor. Gabe balances a part-time job while doing school. Gabe loves sports as well as communicating with all sorts of people and hopes to combine both in his future career. In his free time, Gabe enjoys going on long walks, and hanging out with his friends. Gabe is very passionate about routines that can help everybody's life and has experienced how impactful they can be in college.