With time zones being difficult, students offer advice on how to navigate remote classes.
Online classes, different time zones and isolation can seem overwhelming. Time begins to seem irrelevant, one can begin to feel disconnected from their peers and due dates never seem to stop coming. If another semester of living in a different time zone seems difficult, don’t worry! We have collected tips on how to survive online school in a different time zone.
Take advantage of free time
While working in a different time zone, it can be hard to constantly convert time. It’s enough to make anyone’s brain ache. However, since classes happen at obscure times, there will more likely be more “free time” to do homework because there are quiet moments where your notifications from school are not flooding in.
“The mornings were nice because it was later like my classes would start at 10 o’clock. That was nice. Sleep in a little bit, have a nice breakfast, plan out my day,” said Emily Anastasi, a sophomore music education and English major who worked in Mountain Time.
Let’s not forget deadlines. Once you’ve figured out when things are due, you might have extra time to finish homework. Deadlines might be at 3 a.m. rather than midnight meaning you either get extra time to finish the assignment or you can turn it in early and go to bed.
Communicate, communicate, communicate
If you haven’t told them already, your professors need to know that you are working in a different time zone. If you’re working on a group project, tell your classmates that you are in a different time zone. Let any professor or leadership in charge of any extracurricular activities that you are involved in know. Continuously help people by communicating that you can’t do 3 p.m. PST because you will be asleep. This communication allows for grace.
Another benefit within time zone communication is that there is often no need for small talk. You have to get right to the point as your counterpart might be falling asleep within the next hour.
According to Fast Company, “There’s less small talk when you work asynchronously. This makes sense: It’s weird to ask someone, ‘How’s it going?’ and then wait two hours until they wake up, see your message, and respond.”
Utilize planning tools
“The hardest thing is probably getting used to the schedule. Everything is converted to Pacific Standard Time and for me, it’s only three hours ahead,” said David Fouts, a freshman international relations and honors humanities major who works in Eastern Standard Time. He said what helped him convert time was writing everything down in a planner.
Planners are helpful, but before you put anything into your calendar, triple-check that it is correct. Your brain has a hard time understanding time zones, and you don’t want to think about it once it’s written down.
Other great planning tools include Google Calendar and Canvas.
Google Calendar is in your time zone, so once you’ve completed the time conversion you can place it into your calendar, and you don’t have to worry about it. Canvas changes all of your due dates to your time zone and makes it easier to turn your assignments in on time.
Be flexible
If you participate in extracurricular activities, have a virtual on-campus job or there is a group project in a class, you might have to be flexible.
Ivy Lu, a senior communication major who works in Greenwich Mean Time, agrees, “I did have group projects last semester, and we had to make sure that the meeting time works for every person in the group, and being in a different time zone does make it more challenging.”
Time zones often mean getting used to another schedule and adjusting. You might have to have a meeting at a slightly inconvenient time; that is just the nature of remote classes. Learning to be flexible is an important life skill, especially considering the world we live in currently.
Connect with others
When you are in a different time zone than your peers, it can be difficult and you might feel disconnected from APU. However, it is important to ensure that you keep in touch with those friends. Fouts assures others that people still want to talk to you regardless of your time zone. Lu says that social media and APU chapels help her to feel in touch with the community.
So, reach out! Find out what connects you to the APU community and incorporate that activity into your daily rhythms.
Lu leaves us with one final piece of advice, “I think I would say that working from home is something that we didn’t want in the beginning. However, enjoy the process. You can learn a lot of things, and grow from it.”
Even though sometimes tasks might feel overwhelming during online school, changing your mindset and implementing a schedule can help one succeed.