At 16-17 years old, it is still difficult to clearly understand who to be.
Together with Maria Kosberg, mathematics teacher and head of the educational content team at Skysmart Class, we tell you how to choose a university in a few simple steps and develop a strategy to pass the Unified State Exam to get where you really want. .
1. Choose your area of interest
Deciding on a profession “once and for all”, as happened 50 years ago, no longer makes sense. Most likely, the chosen field of activity will change even before the student has time to write his final work at the university.
The world is changing very quickly, and to keep up with the changes, it is necessary to study throughout life and constantly master new skills. And not only for yesterday’s graduates, but also for experienced professionals.
Therefore, the first task is to determine the area of current interests: education, finance, sports, architecture, as well as a key skill. For example, some are good at teaching, some at management, some are excellent at project work, and some can calculate quickly and accurately. At the intersection of area and skill, there are definitely a dozen professions that would be suitable.
2. Determine the best universities to apply to.
Once you have identified your area of interest and skills, you can start looking for a university that teaches this. Specialization or lack thereof is worth paying attention to.
If a student clearly understands what he wants to be and his aspiration lasts long enough, then he should immediately choose universities with a specific specialization: IT, economics, medicine, etc.
In case of doubt, preference should be given to classical universities, where they provide a more general basic education and there is the opportunity to transfer from one faculty to another.
Don’t limit yourself to just one university of your dreams: use your right to apply to a maximum of 5 universities. Choose those that suit your parameters: passing scores, budget places, cost, location. Of these, select 2 top-tier universities, where it will be more difficult to enter, 2 medium-sized universities, for which points will probably be enough for admission, and a backup option, which you will definitely enter if everything works out. It doesn’t go entirely according to plan.
3. Evaluate the real level of knowledge
Before the Unified State Exam, solve 3-4 “tests” for each of the selected subjects, evaluate the results. It is best to contact your teacher about this so that the evaluation is objective.
Then you will distinguish 3 types of tasks: those that are guaranteed to succeed, those in which there are errors, but in general there is knowledge, and those that you have not even begun to complete, because it is usually not clear how to do it. solve them.
First, we work on what was partially obtained, and then we sequentially work on each task from the category “it is not entirely clear how to solve it.” However, it is important to spend time each week on familiar tasks to bring skills to automaticity.
4. Make a detailed preparation plan
Having estimated how many points you can add and knowing how many are needed to enter a university, it is not difficult to subtract one from the other. This is the number of points you need to get. It is advisable to distribute them in advance between subjects and tasks, answering the question “Why tasks and in which subjects is it easier to add the required points with reservation?” This approach will allow you to clearly understand what needs to be done to achieve a result and not to disperse your efforts on everything at once, but to focus on the main thing.
If there is little time left before the exam and the gap between the current score and the desired one is large, it is better to contact a tutor or take a course.
