Academic Strategies

Interested in making Dean’s List? Want to graduate with honors, or just to improve your grades in certain classes? On this site you’ll find resources and strategies to help good students do even better, and to help all students overcome challenges. Follow the links below to find out more!

• Class Participation
• Effective Writing Strategies
• Grading Criteria for College Writing At USM
• How Counseling Can Improve Academic Performance
• Improving Concentration
• Improving Memory
• Learning From Lectures
• Overcoming Procrastination
• Preparing for Tests
• Quantitative Learning
• Reading College Textbooks
• Taking Good Lecture Notes
• Taking Essay Exams
• Test Taking Tips
• Time Management Strategies
• Why Bother With Time Management?

Citing Sources

The USM Library has put together a “one-stop shopping” site for students on how to properly cite sources of information. This includes links to citation styles such as APA and MLA, and examples of citing sources in the body of the paper.

Research Tutorials

Check out USM Library’s series of 3-minute podcast tutorials designed to help you find good sources of information, and cite those sources properly.

Think all resources on the web are of the same caliber? Think again! This USM Library website contains handouts, links, and overall tips for evaluating web resources when doing research.

Plagiarism

What is plagiarism, and how can I avoid it?

• This USM Library site includes a definition of plagiarism, a fun, animated video podcast, and a link to USM’s Academic Integrity Policy.
• Here is a useful (and printable) handout about plagiarism created by the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.