What to do after midterms

After you receive your midterm marks your performance will either match your expectations or it will not.  If you expected to do well and you achieved high grades you're off to a great start (keep it up!), but please don't despair if your marks weren't so hot because there's plenty you can do between now and finals.  You will only have less time to make positive changes if you put off analyzing your performance until later.  At some point in the future it will be too late, but that day isn't today or tomorrow.

As long as you're a student it's important to understand that good intentions are necessary for success, yet they are never sufficient.  (This should be obvious because everyone is not successful despite their best intentions.)  Ask yourself how well you prepared for your exams.  Remember:  honesty counts.  Did you scrape together some study time in the few days leading up to many tests or did you make your very best effort?  

Prioritize catching up on key concepts as soon as possible.  It's very likely that a solid grasp of the earlier material is required to make sense of the later material, which is often more challenging.  Also, clarify the relevance of anything that you're unsure about.  Your instructors understand that it's easy to miss the forest for the trees, especially when you're new to a particular subject.

Organize your efforts by focusing on two things:  (1) understanding why you lost marks and (2) how you will avoid the same kinds of errors in the future.  Sure this creates extra work for you, but remember school is the only time when you truly work for yourself!