Stress relief, tutoring available for finals week

Exam week is fast approaching and students might be stressed or in need of academic help. To provide extended services to students, the James Branch Cabell Library is open for 24 hours until the semester’s end. Also, dorms are implementing all-day quiet hours to facilitate studying.

Despite these extra services, many students come across last-minute problems while studying. For these students, drop-in tutoring is available the week of exams from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

“We have anywhere from five to seven tutors during any given hour covering foreign language, math and science, the humanities, social sciences,” said Jennifer Lee, coordinator of tutoring at the Campus Learning Center.

Lee said the tutoring service is popular and anticipates it will be used a lot during exam week. So far this semester, the Learning Center has 1,000 more tutoring hours on record then this time last year.

“We’ve especially had a lot of freshmen students or new students because of their UNIV classes,” Lee said. “They’ve been visiting us as part of their class. I don’t know what percentage of those students are UNIV students, but we’ve had almost 4,400 hours of tutoring this semester.”

Sometimes, Lee said, studying for finals can be particularly hard for freshmen who have never taken college finals.

“I think that studying in general is an acquired skill,” Lee said. “A lot of time students don’t learn that in high school.”

Tutoring is a good resource, Lee said, because all the tutors are A/B students and earned at least 40 credit hours.

“They’ve had some experience in college and most of them are more than happy to share what worked for them,” Lee said. “They’re happy to explore other options too if certain students are tactile versus visual learners.”

In addition to tutoring, Lee said it is important to remember to relax during finals week. She suggests setting goals and creating a personal reward system.

“Say tonight you’re going to study and . you’re going to get through X amount of chapters; give yourself a reward,” Lee said. “Going to Starbucks or going to Cold Stone or whatever it is that you have fun doing.”

Karthik Murthy, a biomedical engineering major, works with Project Reach through the Wellness Resource Center. Murthy, and others at Project Reach, have been handing out stress-relief goody bags, providing free five-minute massages and providing information to students about relieving stress and staying healthy.

“We know that finals are coming up next week and people are under a lot of stress studying for them, trying to cram in that last bit for next week,” Murthy said.
He said stress can get in the way of students preparing for their finals.

“If you’re stressing out, then you’re not really focusing on what your objective is,” Murthy said. “You’re not really focusing on trying to get that A.”

Aisha Oxendine, a nationally certified therapeutic masseuse, was hired by the university to give the massage sessions that were held at the Wellness Resource Center earlier this week. She says massages are effective stress relievers for students.

“Stress is the number one problem during exams and really it’s just good for people to just take a minute for themselves and remember to breath and relax their muscles,” Oxendine said. “When they’re very much in their head, it brings them back into their body.”

There is a connection between relaxation and performing well in school, she said.

“A lot of people maybe would have test anxiety or maybe aren’t getting enough sleep,” Oxendine said. “If they can get their bodies relaxed, it helps their minds function better.”

Jennifer Barber, a graduate assistant for Project Reach, said they prepared more than 500 stress relief goody bags consisting of tea, popcorn, pens and highlighters to help students study. In addition to these resources at the Well, she says there are other ways to relax during exam week.

“VCU offers plenty of things that students can get involved in,” Barber said. “They can go to the gym. They can take the free yoga classes. (There are) places where they can go, like the Commons, and just relax.”
Barber said Project Reach is helping students simply by reminding them that exams are coming up.

“Just getting them prepared to start thinking now about next week will help them manage their time for exams,” Barber said.