“Failing to plan is planning to fail.”

– John Wooden, legendary UCLA men’s basketball coach

On Friday night, the University of Maryland Baltimore County, the lowest seeded team in the field of 64 teams (a team on no-one’s radar minus the guy who manages the school’s Twitter feed), upset the University of Virginia, the highest seeded team in the tournament. It was the first time that has ever happened in 135 games featuring a 16- and 1-seed. How did it happen? It did not happen by chance. Rather, UMBC followed the advice of Coach Wooden and developed a sound game plan and then executed that plan to perfection to emerge victorious. The same approach applies to being successful in school, too. Performing well in school requires planning and intentional execution. Some ways students can “plan to succeed:”

Create a homework agenda each day after school to determine an order and sequence for homework and to practice estimating time on task (which helps with future planning).
Create weekly or monthly calendars (on paper or via an app) to track homework, long-term assignments, and outside-of-school commitments.
Read directions carefully to be sure they understand what each assignment entails before beginning.
Begin organizing for exams a few (more) days in advance by gathering all the relevant information so when it’s time to study, they are fully prepared.