A day in someone else's shoes

We all know the type, every year you watch them stand on stage, receive an obscene amount of awards for coming first in every subject and having ‘outstanding commitment’ to activities you didn’t even know were a thing, before receiving an awkwardly long ‘personal clap.’

The high achiever.

But all bitter-tall-poppy-syndrome-roasting aside, there’s no denying that we’d all kill for the chance to be on that stage. And obviously, the best way to become a high achiever would be to start acting like one; find out what they do, and do it yourself. Pretty straight forward.

Luckily, here at Atomi we have an oversupply of high achievers. So I cornered George Harper (ATAR 99.85, 8th in the state for Chemistry) to have a chat. Here’s what he had to say:

Did you dedicate 100% of your time to study?

No, I don’t think 100% focus on study is a good move. Don’t get me wrong I studied A LOT but I was also really involved in extracurricular throughout school. I played a musical instrument and I did this all the way through year 12 - I went to Scots if you want a hint as to which one. I know a few mates who sacked their extracurriculars for HSC, but I thought having a balance was really good. In general, stuff like this and playing sport was a great stress-relief because it made me feel productive. I think having multiple things to focus on makes you more disciplined and forces you to be organised.

Do you think other high achievers would agree that having a packed schedule is best?

High achievers come in all shapes and sizes right. I know people that studied 10 hours per day and didn’t have any mates. I also know high achievers who played soccer, had a girlfriend and went out a lot. So I can’t speak for everyone, but I definitely think that the reason a lot of high achievers have crazy schedules is because it gives you routine, structure and forces you to be efficient. It’s like that saying, ‘if you want something done, give it to a busy person.’

If you have training at 7pm each night, I guarantee that you’ll push to get all your study done before then. You’ll be forced to only focus on the most important things, because you literally have no time for anything else. As opposed to someone who has all night to do their work, they’ll procrastinate and take 3 hours to do 30 mins of actual work.

What do you think of those people doing 10 hours of study per day?

Honestly, I think they are lying to themselves. Unless you are a complete freak of nature (or bionic) there is no way you can study for that long and be completely productive. At least not consistently. There are times when you have to study that hard, but generally if you’re actually being productive you don’t need to slog it out for that long all the time.

So how did you go about your study?

In terms of actually studying I think the biggest thing was that I made sure everything I did was productive. I didn’t waste time on something if I didn’t think it would benefit me.

I knew from the start that having nicely formatted notes or 200 flashcards I’m never going to look at wouldn’t get me very far. Instead, I made sure I did a lot of practice questions and stuff that forces you to actually think. My notes are really long and done in full sentences, because I would read the textbook and try to summarise it in my own words. That forced me to actually think about the content and summarise it. Sitting there and copying out info into dot points doesn’t require any thought, yet everyone does it that way.

For me, it was all about understanding the content, not just memorising it. As part of that, I jumped on things early. If I didn’t fully understand something 100% I would ask my teacher to go over it again and again and again. Then once it ‘clicked’ everything became easy.

Social studier or closet studier?

A bit of both really. I did work with friends a lot but the trick is to work with both smart and not so smart people.

I had gun friends that would challenge me and give me a competitive push, which was super important. But I also worked with mates that were less academic. Explaining something to someone who doesn’t get it is a good way to force you to summarise the content and get your head around it. If you can’t explain something clearly and simply then you don’t understand it well enough. You’ll find the gaps in your knowledge real quick when you’re teaching.

Did you have any weird study habits or myths that you thought worked?

Yeah I think everyone does. I remember jumping onto Google and searching ‘best way to remember notes’ and stuff like that. I read that your brain is most absorbent just before you go to sleep, so each night I’d read my notes just before bed.

I did the standard ‘record your notes and listen to them overnight,’ I stuck a lot of stuff on the walls around my room. I also did real world association stuff, like the night before my Chem exam I went to the kitchen and got out all the products and detergents and tried to classify them as anionic, cationic and non-ionic and relate their properties to their class. I have no idea if that stuff actually worked or if it was just a placebo.

Any guilty pleasures?

Food. I love food, but I don’t feel guilty about it at all. Not even a little bit.

Eating an awesome meal made me feel good and was a great reward. So if I had been wrecking myself with hard study I thought it was fair to grab a great feed. Especially Thai. I still do that now at work.

I also made an effort to go out a lot. I don’t know if that’s a guilty pleasure or not but I would never say no to an 18th because of school or study. I’m a firm believer that doing the HSC doesn’t mean you need to put everything else in your life on hold. When you look back on your best memories of school, your ATAR doesn’t feature in that chat. You remember your mates, the parties, funny stuff that happens in class, it’d be a massive shame if your ATAR was the only thing you had to show for it.

Overall, there’s a few things my chat with George made me realise. The biggest thing was that his schedule wasn’t all that crazy. He wasn’t some superhuman robot that doesn’t need food or sleep to function. So, if high achievers like George aren’t that different to your regular slightly-above-average student, then what is it about them that makes them so... well... high achieving?

There’s a few key things we can put this down to:

1. Study isn’t the only thing in high achievers lives. Sure George put in some solid studying but having other commitments made him more efficient, reduced stress and allowed him to have a good time.
2. Efficiency and productivity. If you can get 3 hours of work done in 1 hour then you only have to study a third of the time. High achievers focus on the most important things and the things that are going to make the biggest difference. There is no point doing mindless study.
3. Do what works for you. High achievers know what they like and what they don’t like. If group study is useful, if eating good meals helps, if doing weird study practices lifts your spirits then you should do those things. Don’t force yourself to do what other people say is good practice.

So take a leaf out of George’s book and give your daily schedule a makeover. Next thing you know you’ll be standing on the stage, holding a pile of books high enough to cover your smug smile as you listen to your well deserved ‘personal clap.’