Next time you’re in a classroom, look around. You’ll notice that there are very, very few people who always sit with perfect posture. Especially students. We spend such long hours sitting in class and studying that it’s really tempting to slump. I know I do.

So for this week’s workout, I’ve put together a few exercises that will engage the muscles in your core and back that contribute to your posture. You don’t need much room, so if you’re really daring, just do them right in the library. No shame.

1. Tripod Balance

Begin on your hands and knees, with your hands directly under your shoulders and your knees directly below your hips. Engage your abs to support your lower back, and imagine your shoulder blades gliding down your back as opposed to hunching up toward your ears. Lift your right arm off the ground and hold it in line with your back. Hold for 30 seconds, then do the same with the left arm.

2. Contralateral Balance

Lift your right arm and your left leg off the ground. They should be in line with your back, making a long straight line from your right hand to your left foot. Really pull your bellybutton toward your spine to maintain the alignment of your back. Hold for 30 seconds. Repeat on the other side.

3. Moving contralateral balance

Start the same way as in exercise 2, lifting your right arm and left leg off the ground. Next, pull your right elbow and left knee in toward the center of your body. Imagine drawing them in toward your bellybutton. Then, extend your right arm and left leg back out into a straight line. Do this 10 times and then repeat on the other side.

What I’m wearing: top by Zobha, pants by Soybu, shoes by New Balance.

Garnet is a student at Columbia University in New York City. She is “that person” who starts dancing at a party when everyone else is standing around, and if there were a Facebook stalking Olympics, she would be a gold medalist. She also loves cheesy 90s music, and almost died of happiness when Vanilla Ice retweeted her. Once. Follow her on Twitter.

When I began my freshman year of college, I was overwhelmed to say the least. I was overwhelmed from meeting so many new people, overwhelmed by how sinfully delicious the late night food scene was, and overwhelmed by the workload. All of the sudden, I was getting numerous weeknight texts from people (whose names I didn’t even remember putting into my phone) about amazing parties. And I went, even though I still had hundreds of pages of reading to do for the next day! (Sidenote: scheduling classes for Friday is a rookie mistake.You will never go to these.) But then, as my grades began slipping, a revolutionary thought occurred to me: maybe I don’t have to do all of the readings! But how does an overwhelmed college freshman know when they do or don’t have to do the assigned readings?

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There was an interesting article posted on the HuffPo detailing SeekingArrangements.com, a website pairing “sugar daddies” with “sugar babies.” The sugar babies are overwhelmingly college aged women and recent graduates saddled with a variety of financial obligations, and the sugar daddies are your typical wealthy older men who have a fixation with women young enough to be their granddaughters.

Inspired by the article, I began to wonder if I knew anyone who may be a sugar baby, or would consider being one. My friends and I are generally middle to upper middle class with college degrees, and many of us have, at the very least, student loan debt. None of us ever talked about finances in college, but once we graduated, it became a lot more common for us to occasionally freak out about the debt that we’ll eventually have to pay back (yay for deferment options!). I couldn’t think of anyone I know who would seriously take up being a sugar baby, and a huge part of that has to do with our privilege. We come from middle to upper class households. We have parents who are able to support us while we’re still trying to stand on our own feet. We know we’ll never have to starve, that we’ll always have a home to go to. Read More »

Right before I sat down to write this I opened a letter (yes because apparently people still send those) informing me that come April I will be able to pick up my cap and gown. I looked at the letter, rolled my eyes, and thought April? Really? Why are they sending me this now when I don’t need to pick it up until April? But still I opened up my Google Calendar and went to plug in the date. But oh wait…what’s that?

April is only two clicks months away.

TWO MONTHS.

That’s shorter than a season of the Bachelor.

And that doesn’t even account for all the days off I have coming up.

Currently, I’m enjoying a five-day weekend. I’ll head into class one day next week, and then two more the week after, and then it’s Spring Break time. And when I get back there will only be three more weeks of March. And then it’s April. A month filled with weeks shortened by Easter and Passover holidays. The month I thought was oh so far away. The month I can pick up my cap and gown. My last month of undergraduate classes. My last month as a college student. Maybe April is closer than I thought. I mean, how did we even get to February already anyway?

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I love the first week back after Thanksgiving break.

No scratch that, I hate it, actually. But what I do like is what that week represents. It’s the beginning of the end. The start of the finish. You’re over the hump. The semester is almost over. You’ve finally reached those last few dreadful weeks. And okay, maybe that doesn’t seem like something to be happy about, maybe you want to pull your hair out right now? Maybe you’re stressed? Sure, but just think, in a couple of weeks it will all be over.

How can you be sure that there’s a light at the end of the tunnel? Here are just a few signs that the semester is almost over.

10. You’ll do anything to avoid your homework. Okay. Time to get serious. You have a lot to get done these less few weeks. Time to buckle down and start working. No distractions. No Facebook. No phones. Reading time. But wait…you have been meaning to reorganize your desk. And your bookshelf. And…you get the idea.

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It’s Thanksgiving week. You know what that means: more food than you’ll ever be able to eat, run ins with family members you’d really rather avoid and those awkward moments when everyone gathers together to say what they’re thankful for.

Friends.
Family.
Happiness and health and blah blah blah.

Those are all great things to be thankful for, important things, yes.  But what about the not so important things, the little things that we all take for granted? Here’s what I’m thankful for this holiday season…

10. Trashy Tabloids. Reading about the problems of the rich and famous makes everything in my life seem so much less problematic. Sure, maybe I’m having boy problems, but at least my guy didn’t leave me for Angelina Jolie. And maybe I’m worried about wearing a bikini to the beach, but at least there’s no one zooming in on my butt cheeks. (At least not that I know of.) Celebrity scandal really helps me see the big picture.

9. Steve Madden’s Fall Boot Collection. Whenever I’m having a bad day, I just head over to Steve Madden’s website and stare at some shoes. Laugh if you want, but it totally works. They’re like works of art, I swear. And even though I’ve put myself on a boot buying ban until after the holidays, I still enjoy purusing the styles. And you will too.

8. Chocolate. I’m sorry; do you really need an explanation for this one? I didn’t think so. Read More »

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In elementary school all that was required of us to get decent grades was coloring inside the lines. Middle school and high school introduced to the word “studying” and, soon after, a genuine dislike for the word. But college is where the work is no joke. The classes are hard. The workload is heavy. And the social scene is exploding. So how does a college girl stay on top of it all?

Grab your notebook and furry pencils (or whatever it takes to get you ready to hit the books), because I’ve got a list of things you can do to get on another list: the Dean’s List.

10. Invest in a planner: Good grades begin with organization (and writing down your assignments). Find a planner that works for you, whether it is the one provided by your school or that handy little calendar in your iPhone. Once you have it, write everything in it. Meetings, to-do lists, homework assignments, phone numbers. It is so much easier to manage all your information when it is centralized in one place.

9. Get to class: Self-explanatory. Abide by your class schedule and don’t skip. Though you may laugh in the face o that 8:30a.m. Theology class on Friday morning, remember that professors can and will deduct for absences. It would be a shame to miss that letter grade because you could not roll out of bed to get to your desk in the morning.

8. Get a change in scenery: The library is not for everyone. Some people cannot cram themselves into a desk on the third floor and work until 2 a.m. Others openly admit that the library is a better social scene than a bar on Friday night. Find a study space that works for you, and you ALONE. My personal study space is a Starbucks near my school. I pack up all my books, grab a skim latte and park myself at a table in the corner for hours at a time. Read More »

Apparently ridiculous college courses are the new trend on campuses all over the world.  I’d go so far as to call them “unnecessary,” but the 440 people who just enrolled in Potsdam University’s e-mail flirtation class would beat down my door (or fill my inbox…) in disagreement.  Yes, you read that right- one German university is actually offering a master’s course on how to flirt via modern technology.  It promises to give you the skills to “get someone else’s heart beating fast while yours stays calm.”

At first glance, I thought this was the most ridiculous thing I had ever heard; seriously, a class that teaches nerds to be better sexters?  But really, it’s probably going to be really helpful to some of these people.  Everyone deserves to know how to drop a well-placed “Did U know I used 2 be a gymnast?” or a “Miss ur face, come get in my bed.”

Of course, this got me to thinking; what are some other quirky classes that college students actually need?  (I mean, beyond all that Astronomy…tooootally going to use that one day!) Read More »

While we may not like all of them, rules exist for a reason. They keep us safe, they keep us sane, they keep some sort of order in this world of ours. And that applies to college campuses, too. There are all sorts of rules that we live by: no food in the library, no drinking in the dorms, no sex in the stacks.

But with all the attention given to those scoundrels who dare bring a Diet Coke into the ‘brary, those university officials missed a few important rules. The kind that would benefit everyone, allowing all of us to be more successful in our studies and more productive members of society.

We didn’t forget about them, though, so we at CollegeCandy are starting a revolution. Join us on our quest to establish some new campus rules and rid our classrooms of evil… and PDA.  Read More »