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Making Friends While Living in a College Dorm

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The friends that you meet while you are living in the dorm at college are the ones that you will likely have the rest of your college life. Some of them will even still be your friend throughout your life. The ones that are made in the dorm will most likely be your main group of friends even if you make others along the way.

A number of factors attribute to this. The first factor is because most college students are living away from their parents for the first time and are in a new environment. Since most of the other people around are going through a similar experience, it makes it easier for everyone to relate to each other. For the entire school year you will have the same group of people surrounding you. That will make it likely that you are going to establish a relationship with those people.

There are several ways to enhance the likelihood of meeting new friends while living in the dorm. Leaving your dorm room door open is like saying come on in a visit for awhile. This will leave the impression you are open to meeting new people. When you are eating a meal in the dining hall, invite people to eat with you. This is a good way to get to know someone.

You may want to hang out in the common area. While you are there do not forget to wear one of your Michele watches. This is a good way to strike up a conversation. When you are walking down the hall, be sure to say hello and introduce yourself. If you receive a special treat from home be sure to share. This may help ease your adjustment into the dorm life and what college has to offer you.

Filed Under: Benefits, Online Learning, Sports Tagged With: Cafeteria, Campus, College, College Life, Colleges and Universities, Dormitory, Education, Student

A Guide to Functional Sports Training

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Functional sports training has been used in Europe for many years. Today many North American athletes, coaches and fitness instructors are embracing this training method.

A functional training program is one that is based on the simple principle that the best exercises for an athlete are the ones that improve his or her sport. This means that the exercises used in this training program are sports specific as opposed to exercised that improve the general fitness of an athlete.

What this means for athletes is that all the sports training that they do will be functional. In order for functional sports training to work all the training that is done must have a specific purpose which relates to the sport that the training was designed for. For example weight training is not the best route for a golfer to go. A golfer will need a golf specific training regime in order to excel at his or her sport.

A functional approach to training should ensure that both balance and core strength are the prime goals of the training. Core muscle training will allow the athlete to develop an athletic back. This is very important as it decreases the risk of injury for athletes. It will also increase both the power of the athletes muscles and their agility. Athletes will also find that their balance will become enhanced.

In a sport such as golf a functional sports training regime would emphasize body movements that are used to hit the ball. Generally most athletes use a mixture of sports specific training and general fitness activities. While sports functional techniques will help the athlete excel at a particular sport general fitness activities help them stay interested. Some athletes are very dedicated and do not need to engage in activities that improve their motivation. Others will need to mix up their routine so that they do not get bored.

Filed Under: Majors & Careers, Online Learning Tagged With: Physical exercise, Physical fitness, Sport, Sports training

The Big Ones

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You may have a lot of things on your life list. Maybe you want to go hang gliding, see Paris at night from the Eiffel tower, learn to play piano, or eat at some of the best restaurants in the world. However, there are probably also a handful of larger accomplishments that you’d like to experience. For most people, those include a successful marriage, children who are happy and healthy, and a fulfilling and high-earning career. It is becoming increasingly common for more and more people to seek an advanced degree.

Before the GI bill kicked in at the end of World War II, a high school diploma was considered to be plenty of education for the average citizen. A high school diploma was enough to help you get a good job, or at least a job that could support a family in working-class fashion. Academia was considered the province of a select few, and though it was prestigious, it wasn’t the same kind of prestigious that it is now. Rather than being the sign of the well-heeled and upwardly bound, it indicated a kind of recessiveness and a bookish streak that wasn’t considered strictly healthy.

All that has changed. These days, though far less of them succeed, over sixty percent of high school graduates express a desire to complete an advanced degree. Online education courses, offered through sites like elearners.com, have become ubiquitous over the past ten years. The elitist structure of academia is challenged when the market demands a higher level of education from virtually everyone, and in some ways this is a good thing. Possibilities have opened up that weren’t there before. Tuition is more expensive, but it is easier to find financing as well. It also makes it easier to justify the hard work and long-standing commitment that go into gaining an advanced degree you can always be proud of.

Filed Under: Benefits, Majors & Careers, Online Learning Tagged With: Academic degree, High school, Paris, World War II

Benefits of GMAT Prep Courses

If you’re looking at a career in business and plan to further your education, then you’ll need to take the Graduate Management Admission Test, known as the GMAT. What better way to prepare than by taking GMAT prep courses?

The Graduate Management Admission Test is an extensive test that covers math and English and is required in order to receive admission to a business school. This test uses a computer adaptive format that means the test questions adapt to your skill level, becoming easier or more difficult depending on how you are doing.

It is important to take GMAT prep courses so that you know what you’re in for with this test and can pass it the first time. The prep courses allow you to practice in helpful ways, such as having a test pacer training system, tests that are in the computer adaptive format and course materials that are comprehensive in nature.

With all of these helpful advantages, you can learn more about the actual Graduate Management Admission Test and how to pass it successfully. With the GMAT, you can’t get into business school, which means you can’t graduate with your MBA.

Another advantage of a GMAT prep course is that it gives you a refresher on things you may have forgotten over the years. If it’s been a while since you were in school, the prep courses can give you a heads up on what kind of questions will be asked of you so that you can study or at least have a working knowledge of what to expect.

The point is, this is your career. Why wouldn’t you want to do whatever is possible to ensure that you’ll pass the most important test of your career? With a GMAT prep course, you will at the very least have a good idea of what to expect.

Filed Under: Making The Grade, Online Learning, Training Tagged With: GMAT prep, Graduate Management Admission Test, Master of Business Administration

A Guide to Weight Vest Sports Training

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Regardless of what sport an athlete plays wearing a weight vest during their plyometric training session will make them a faster, stronger and better at their sport.

Plyometrics is an exercise training system that is designed to increase the speed and power of an athlete. This is done so that athletic performance can be increased.

Athletes that use plyometric weight training vests will find that their ability to jump vertically will be improved. These jumps can be increased by about three inches when plyometric training is used. It has been shown in studies that athletes that do not engage in plyometric weighted vest training will make smaller improvements on their performance than athletes that do. This was also proven to be true with jumping and many other aspects of sports performance such as running times and endurance building.

It is important for athletes to understand that plyometric training is very intense. Because of this non-athletes should not try this training method. Unless athletes are extreme athletes they should start the training off slow. In order to do this they should start off with weights that are about two percent of their body weight. Eventually athletes should try to work their way up to using weights that are about ten percent of their body weight.

Ideally athletes should hire a plyometrics trainer before they get started. This is due to the fact that plyometrics is an intense training program that can cause injury if it is not performed properly. Trainers can be hired through gyms however finding one that specializes in plyometrics may be a little bit more difficult than finding a regular personal trainer. If athletes have trouble finding a trainer they can look for trainers on the internet. However it is important to pick one that is both qualified and experienced in plyometrics.

Filed Under: Majors & Careers, Online Learning Tagged With: Personal trainer, Plyometrics, Sport, Weight training

The Physical Affects of Over-training

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Most people think that working out obsessively will lead to a leaner, fitter and stringer body. Unfortunately this is not always the case. Over-training often means that the body will store fat.

To understand how over-training affects the body of an athlete one must understand that physical training puts the body under stress. When the body is stressed it releases a hormone that is called cortisol. Cortisol is released from the adrenal gland and is there to release glucose into the body when it is stressed out. The more a body is stressed the more cortisol is released.

An excess level of cortisol occurs when the body is over-trained. This means the body will have higher base cortisol and insulin levels. This of course will slow down the metabolism and cause weight to be stored at the waist.

Having excess cortisol is not a good sign as it does much more than just block the fat metabolism. As it also suppresses the immune system it can make the athlete feel very sick. Being tired, sick and overweight is not an ideal situation for an athlete.

The best way to stop this from happening is to take time to recover when one is feeling tired or sore after training. Recovery and restoration are very important parts of training that are often overlooked today. If the athlete is taking proper rest and restoration periods there may be another explanation for the high stress levels their body is under.

The stress that athletes feel from school, work, the relationships may also be contributing to their stress levels. If an athlete is training hard and cannot seem to shift the weight around their waist they should be tested for their cortisol levels. Once they know that their body is reacting to the stress of taking on too much they can spend some time resting.

Filed Under: Majors & Careers, Online Learning Tagged With: Adrenal gland, Body, Cortisol, Stress