By Katie Azevedo, M.Ed.
Disclaimer: You might not like what you’re about to read. And I’m okay with that, because my goal is to make school easier for students, and sometimes that means facing reality and being open-minded to hearing hard things.
If you put aside your feelings and take the following advice seriously, you’ll be so much better off than you are now.
School, whether high school or college, isn’t supposed to be comfortable. It’s supposed to grow you. And growth almost always stings a little. (Or a lot, but you’ll be okay.)
Below are six pieces of school advice that might hurt your feelings, but will absolutely make you a better, happier student.
School Advice That Will Probably Hurt Your Feelings
Please know that the following six pieces of school advice come from a place of love and care for all students, and also from over twenty years of teaching teenagers and young adults.
1. If You Get Caught Cheating And You Cheated, Admit It
Cheating is so dumb. Don’t do it. It will always come back to bite you. However, if for some reason you choose to cheat and you get caught, don’t lie about it.
The people who catch you cheating already know you cheated. No offense, but they’re likely a wee bit smarter than you. (Listen, I told you this post might hurt your feelings, and I was serious. But the reality is that if you’re a student and you get caught by a teacher, professor or administrator, they are smarter than you simply because they have more life experience.)
You made a choice, and you have to own it. Teachers, professors, and even parents respect honesty, and even though you’ll still have to face the consequences of cheating, everything will be worse if you lie about it too.
Every second you spend defending a lie (that everyone knows is a lie) is time you could be using to fix what led you to cheat in the first place.
Plus, lying makes you look foolish. You might think people are buying your story, but oh, they’re not.
2. If You Want Your Parents To Stop Nagging You, Prove They Don’t Have To
You hate being nagged by your parents. Fair enough. But did you ever stop to think that they hate nagging you even more?
I’m a parent of two teenagers, and trust me when I tell you that nagging them to do the things they’re supposed to do is the worst. The worst! But I’ll tell you what I always tell them: we wouldn’t have to nag you if you did the thing in the first place.
The reality is that nagging usually stops when your actions make it unnecessary. If you handle your responsibilities, meet your deadlines, do your homework and follow through on things you’re supposed to follow through on, your parents won’t nag you. It is LITERALLY that easy.
Objectively, this is what “nagging” conversations sound like. Try to see the absurdity in this scenario without getting defensive:
Parent: Did you do your homework?
Student: I’m going to.
Parent: (5 hours later) Did you do your homework yet?
Student: Stop nagging me! You’re always nagging. I’ve got it. You don’t trust me.
Parent: Fine.
Parent: (next day): Ugh, you got a 0 for your missing assignment!
Student: Seriously, you’re so mean.
This conversation is so common. I also know that it causes a lot of stress in families, so I don’t mean to make light of a tense situation. But assuming there is no learning disability or mental health barrier, the solution to stop the nagging is to do things without needing to be nagged.
3. Using AI To Do Your Thinking Is One Of The Dumbest Choices You Can Make
I know AI isn’t going anywhere, and there’s little that schools can do to stop you from using it on your own time. But using AI to do your thinking for you is one of the absolute DUMMEST choices you could make. And the long-term impact of you doing that is worse than you can ever imagine.
If you use AI to perform THINKING tasks (including writing, because writing IS thinking), you’re literally missing the entire point of school. In this post here, I argue that the point of school is only partially about the content – the real point is so much deeper than that.
The whole point of school, especially high school, is to learn how to do hard things when you don’t want to, how to think critically, and how to solve problems. When you pass these tasks off to AI, you’re denying yourself the single greatest opportunity to develop these skills … for what, a homework grade? An A on a paper you’re going to get absolutely nothing from because you didn’t write it?
I’m not some stubborn, naive, anti-technology person who’s telling you to go back to writing essays with pencils on yellow paper. I’m actually a super technology geek (I can call myself that) who’s borderline obsessed with learning about AI.
But COME ON. You have to know deep down that every time you turn to AI to come up with an idea for an essay, solve a math problem, or even write your emails, you’re cheating yourself. I know you know that.
Every single time you turn to AI to do something that’s even mildly uncomfortable, you destroy your own thinking ability (proven in this study) and build the horrible habit of using AI for the next task…and the next…and the next.
Don’t you care? Actual question to you: Don’t you care about your future ability to THINK? Is “easy” now really worth sacrificing your creativity, uniqueness, and problem-solving powers for the rest of your life?
4. You’re On Your Screen WAY Too Much, So When You Say You Don’t Have Time, You’re Lying (To Yourself)
You do have time. You’re just spending it on your phone or on the wrong screens. And before you say you don’t, have you actually tracked or counted how much time you spend on your phone/screens (not including homework)?
Yes, you’ll occasionally have days when you legitimately don’t have time to get all your schoolwork done. These days can be stressful, but they’re not that common. If you face reality and do the math, you will see that you spend way more time on your phone than you think you do.
Let’s say you have 45 minutes to work on a draft of an essay. If you sit down at the computer with no phone and absolutely no distractions, and you write your essay for 45 minutes, you could literally write pages of material. But if you have your phone next to you and distracting tabs open on your computer, you might be able to write a paragraph at most in the same 45 minutes.
Why on earth would you do this to yourself?
Put. The. Phone. Away. For the love of all things, put it away.
5. If You Want To Be Taken Seriously, Do What You Say You’re Going To Do When You Say You’re Going To Do It
Like it or not, people won’t take you seriously if you don’t do what you say you’re going to do, when you say you’re going to do it.
There’s just something really … icky…about not delivering on your promises, no matter how small. It gives the impression of laziness, of arrogance, of not caring. And worse, it suggests that you’re not capable of doing the thing, even if you are.
You have one reputation. Every choice you make, every word you say, and every single thing you do is a chance to build it or break it. Unfortunately, it doesn’t take much to break it, and the rough truth is that it’s hard (super hard!) to repair once you become a person who doesn’t do what they say they’re going to do.
That’s the definition of being reliable, and if you want people to take you seriously, you must be reliable. Whether it’s an assignment, a meeting, or a group project, people notice when you don’t deliver. And it’s not a good look.
Of course, sometimes life happens and we’re unable to follow through on a promise, but when that happens, direct, early and honest communication is key. Don’t wait until the last minute to
6. Motivation is Irrelevant.
To be fair, I’ll begin this final piece of school advice by admitting that things are definitely easier when you feel motivated. So in that sense, motivation isn’t completely irrelevant from the aspect of enjoying a task.
That said, far too many students overly depend on motivation and forget the importance of discipline.
Motivation is just a feeling, like happiness, sadness and anger. That means that just like other feelings, motivation is temporary and unreliable. Discipline, however, is reliable and powerful.
Here’s what I’m really trying to say: your feelings about a task you’re expected to do shouldn’t have anything to do with whether or not you do it.
Said differently: do what you’re expected to do, even if you don’t want to do it.
Said a third way, just for emphasis: You can NOT want to do something and STILL DO IT.
Top performing students know this. They may think an assignment is dumb, boring or pointless (and it might be), but they do it anyway. They don’t let their feelings stop them from taking action. They don’t wait for motivation to hit. They don’t let their “this assignment is pointless” thoughts have anything to do with completing the assignment.
The ability to do things you don’t want to do is a sign of emotional regulation and maturity. If you’re not there yet, it’s okay, but the sooner you learn to manage your emotions, the easier school will be and the less drama you’ll experience around school work.
Final School Advice for Students
None of this school advice is meant to make you feel bad. It’s meant to gently wake you up to some of the realities of school that not many people talk about.
My approach with SchoolHabits has always been to be compassionate and direct, as I believe that’s what students deserve. But the world doesn’t reward people who avoid discomfort, blame others, deny accountability or act disingenuously. It rewards people who do the exact opposite. Owning your actions, being reliable, and facing discomfort without drama are characteristics of top performers. That’s you.
