Each month, Cougar News staff comes up with a question. That question is plied to students, faculty and staff. The answers are printed here. Everyone is enlightened.
Are you organized? If so, what's your secret? If not, how could you improve?
I feel I am a well organized person. Attending a military academy and 26 years of military service has forced me to be. Two techniques I use are lists and software.
I keep lists of various projects and tasks and cross off items as they are completed. All of us are required to multi-task in our daily lives. The lists help me to re-focus between tasks and constantly re-prioritize. Also, many of the software applications we have available to us, such as GroupWise, provide us tools, such as color coding and receiving electronic reminders.
Bill Blitt
Dean of Academic Affairs
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I am not organized in the least at home, which is odd, considering Virgos are supposed to be terribly organized. I pretty much have my own system of organization that is centered around small piles of things no one else can understand. I, however, know where everything is, it just looks a bit messy. In classes, however, I try to stay very organized. I use pouch-style folders in a ring binder so that nothing falls out, like with the regular open folders. I keep every piece of paper given to me by the professor in that folder, along with anything I feel I should print out from WebCT. Each class has it's own folder and I keep things pretty organized that way. In photography class I'm even more organized, with a single ring binder for all my negatives, all the assignments and all my finished prints in one place. I suppose being unorganized in one area of my life doesn't mean I'm not organized in another! The only secret I have is to have a place for papers and notes from each class in an easy-to-reach place. The only problem here is over-organizing and having, say a ring binder for each class, which would be so hard to carry around I'd probably give up pretty easily on it. The secret is keeping things as organized as you can while keeping your load as light as you can.
Hope Camp
Student
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If one were to judge me simply by looking in my office, they'd say definitely “no.” However, I like to think of it as organized chaos. To the untrained eye, my work space would appear to be a mass of clutter; however, I know where EVERYTHING is. I'm constantly saying "if only i had more space …" But I'm sure that if I actually did have more space, it would simply lead to more places for me to pile things.
Angela Putman
Professor of Communication Studies
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What is one of the first questions your children ask you when you pick them up from school/daycare? "What's for dinner?" You can eliminate this mundane question by preparing a weekly menu and posting it on the refrigerator or somewhere in kitchen for all to see. This menu system will help you minimize your time of wandering aimlessly in the grocery store and wondering what you will prepare for dinner thereby saving you money too. Always build in a take-out, order in, or eat out night for sanity purposes!
Donna Okaro
Director of Student Life, PRC
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I am a very organized person. I am especially organized when it comes to my classes. I go as far as making the students submit their work in the same color folder for each class! It makes it easier for me to know which class the student is in based on the color of the folder. One of the main things I do to stay organized is place things in file folders and label them before I file them away. Once you let papers pile up, it will take more time to do it later.
Lupita Tinnen
Professor of Photography
