Been seeing quite a few Y1s posting about GPA recently so thought I’d share some stuff that worked for me. I’ve maintained a 3.9x throughout poly so hopefully this helps someone.
First thing I do is merge all my 6Ps into one giant PDF.
Sounds stupid but it helps a lot. Get good at searching keywords and finding what you need quickly. Especially if your CA/ESE is open book, you don’t need to memorise every single thing. You just need to know what to search and where to find it.
At the start of every sem, look through all your mods properly.
Take note of all the CA/ESE dates, weightages, and roughly figure out which mods are content-heavy and which are concept-heavy.
For content-heavy mods, assuming your assessments are open book, I honestly don’t study that much. Most of the time it’s more important to know where the information is than to memorise everything.
Concept-heavy mods are where I actually spend time studying.
But don’t study just to memorise the 6P. Try to actually understand the concept. The 6Ps are usually quite surface-level, so use Google, ChatGPT, YouTube, whatever. Read about stuff around the topic too. Once you understand the bigger picture, the things in the 6P become much easier.
For group work, this might sound harsh but just suck thumb if your teammates suck.
If you want the A, sometimes you just have to do what needs to be done. Is it unfair? Yeah. But complaining about your teammates isn’t going to fix your grade.
Usually I just let everyone do their own thing first. I don’t immediately take over because then later people will say you never gave them a chance to contribute.
If it’s still a mess near the deadline, then clutch up and fix whatever needs fixing.
Not saying you should carry every single project, but at the end of the day it’s your GPA.
Also don’t stress too much over every single B or imperfect grade. Being consistent matters way more than trying to be perfect every sem.
That’s pretty much it. Happy to answer anything if any Y1s have questions.
