Wouldn’t it be great if we didn’t have to rely on student loans to pay for tuition? With recent college grads slowly drowning in a pool of debt, many of them are probably wishing that they had another way to pay for college.

In Indiana, September is a time to save for the future, more specifically, college. Gov. Mitch Daniels declared September “College Savings Month.”

Gov. Daniels wants College Savings Month to be a time for families across the state of Indiana to look to the future and consider the importance of higher education. He also wants parents to recognize the positive influence a college education can have on their children’s future. The state is encouraging parents to look into CollegeChoice 529 Savings Plans.

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Looking for a good way to keep your kids entertained and learn something while they’re at it? The Number Sense app for iPad by Mathomatix fits the bill perfectly. The app features five games to help kindergarteners learn about numbers. The five games are “Do the Dotty,” “Numbrella,” “Booster Balls,” “Fishoonka” and “Toot Toot Train.”

“Do the Dotty” is a connect-the-dots game that teaches children how to count and identify numbers. This game also require a pretty high level of hand-eye coordination, a skill children growing up in the touch-screen may benefit from, but is also at times frustrating when the game doesn’t respond. “Fishoonka” gets kids to learn about the concepts of “greater than,” “lesser than” and “equal to” in an underwater setting. The “Toot Toot Train” game deploys basic principals of addition and subtraction. “Numberella” is another game that involves identifying the values of numbers, and “Booster Balls” is a counting game that involves friendly monsters. The games all feature appealing and colorful graphics.

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When it comes to interviews, there’s a generally held belief that emulating your future boss is a good idea. For example, stay standing until they sit. If your interview is in a cafe or restaurant setting, order something comparable to what your interviewer orders. But there’s one big exception to this rule: alcohol. Even if your potential employer orders an alcoholic beverage first.

New research conducted by Scott Rick from University of Michigan and Maurice E. Schweitzer University of Pennsylvania shows that people perceive you as less intelligent when you drink, even if they are drinking also. Their finding are published in a paper titled “The Imbibing Idiot Bias: Merely Holding an Alcoholic Beverage Can be Hazardous to Your (Perceived) Intelligence.” They simulated interviews and then asked observers to comment on them. Even with the dialogue unchanged, observers found anyone holding an alcoholic beverage less intelligent. If the conversation was a job interview, they found drinkers to seem less hirable. They found that the bias applied to drinkers of both beer and wine, and was unchanged by the gender of the drinker.

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It’s back to school time, and it’s time to bring your dorm into the digital age. Whether it’s a new coffee maker or a new alarm clock, there are several new electronic devices that will make your life easier and your roommate jealous.

Here’s a list of this school year’s hottest gadgets:

Clocky Alarm Clock ($39): No longer will you be able to blame your tardiness on your alarm clock. Clocky has wheels attached to the sides and rolls away out of your reach to keep you from hitting the snooze button excessively.

Pivot Power ($25): This bendy power strip lets you shape it to fit any space. You can twist it, curl it or stretch it. Do whatever you need to do to make all those power cords more organized and less noticeable. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the more complicated, yet important college majors that students can pursue is architecture. Architecture is the art and science of designing and erecting buildings and other physical structures. There are a lot of skills involved in becoming an architect and it’s the type of profession that’s good for those that enjoy drawing and numbers, as well as working hands on with a team on a public project. Without architects, some of the world’s most beautiful buildings wouldn’t be possible, and there is a sense of pride in seeing something you have designed and built yourself, for others to use and enjoy.

If you are interested in perusing a degree in architecture, you’ll want to go to a school well-known for its architecture program. Not only will you get an amazing education, but the school you attend can open a lot of doors when it’s time to get a job. Read the rest of this entry »

As students across the country prepare to embark on their fall semester of college, many students are experiencing a range of emotions: fear, excitement, nervousness, confusion, overwhelmed, etc. A lot of students might find that while they have waited their whole high school careers for these next couple of months, there is the chance that they may actually hate college.

So, what do you do if you get to college and absolutely cannot stand it? Well, here are your options.

• Reflect. Ask yourself if you’re just having a rough couple of weeks or difficulty adjusting. Most students take 5-7 months to really get their bearings at a university and you may just need to stick it out and try a little harder.

• Join a club, sports team or go Greek. An organization can introduce you to a lot of potential new friends and fill your social calendar to distract you from any feelings of homesickness or loneliness. And while Greek recruitment can be difficult in and of itself, I promise it’s worth it in the end!

• Consider transferring to another school. Maybe it’s not the entire college experience you hate, it might just be your living situation, your campus or your professors. Half way through your second semester, if you are still unhappy, consider researching online about transferring to another school that will accept your credits so you don’t have to start all over. Read the rest of this entry »

Most people underestimate how much they will spend on back-to-school supplies.

School supplies may be costing families more than they think. In a voluntary user poll conducted by USAA, people underestimated how much the average American family spends on back-to-school shopping for children in kindergarten through 12th grade by over $100.00. In fact, families will spend an average of $606.00 this year on back-to-school supplies, shoes, clothing and electronics.

But you don’t need to shell out that much this fall. Here are some ideas to help your family save money on back-to-school products. Not only are these tips good for your bank account, many of them are good for the environment too.

1. Pull out last year’s supplies.

Dig out all those school supplies from last year that are still usable. Test pens and markers to make sure they haven’t dried out. Don’t scorn hand-me-downs and put your clothing budget on a diet.

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The first four-year Muslim college in the United States will open its doors for its first semester this year.

Zaytuna College is located in Berkeley, California, near the University of California – Berkeley, and will only offer two degree programs this year: Islamic Law and Theology, and Arabic. These degree programs were developed with an ideology of teaching students about Islam, while staying within a Western history and culture context. Another goal of the founders of Zaytuna is to promote a level of understanding between the Western and Islamic worlds.

“We feel the college is very important in that it provides a grounding for the community in its own tradition—not in a sense to create a difference with the larger society, but to actually normalize its presence within the larger society, that there is no contradiction between being an American and being Muslim,” said Hatem Bazian, a co-founder of Zaytuna College. Read the rest of this entry »

The Adobe Education Store is offering discounts up to 80% off!

As all college students know, a pencil and notebook are not the only school supplies you will need this semester. In fact, the majority of your school supplies will be textbooks and technology products. While textbooks are definitely expensive, thankfully, there are several ways to get around that obstacle. But what about technological software? You used to have to just grit your teeth and bare it, but now Adobe is making buying computer software a cheaper process.

The Adobe Education Store is currently offering students and teachers up to 80 percent off their purchases, slashing expensive software products to fractions of their original prices. For example, the Creative Suite 5 Design Premium Student and Teacher Edition now costs only $449.00, and the basic Photoshop CS5 is a measly $199.00. Rest assured, these are the full versions of the software programs. Also, for a limited time, you do not have to pay any shipping costs when you validate your status as a student or teacher. Read the rest of this entry »

Cleveland

As a newly minted graduate, I frequently get asked why I chose to move all the way from Michigan to New York. The simple answer is there are more writing jobs to be found in New York. For many recent college grads there’s one issue that determines where they live or move: jobs.

I was actually surprisingly pleased to see that the Motor City didn’t come up as first on this list of worst places to live in U.S. from Wallet Pop. The major factors considered include the number of foreclosures, health and fitness of the population, crime rate and unemployment.

Here’s how the nation’s cities ranked:

10. Memphis, Tennessee

Not only does Memphis have a crime rate that’s 90% higher than any other community in Tennessee, it also suffers from corruption among city officials. Not long ago, a city administrator used government funds to purchase big screen TVs.

9. Miami, Florida

Florida may be the sunshine state, but things are not looking so bright in Miami. According to Children’s Health, it’s the second worst city to raise a family. It’s had nearly 40,000 foreclosures and also has a considerable problem with violent crime.

8. Newark, New Jersey

First of all, New Jersey has the most Superfund sites of any other state in the union, meaning its residents are exposed to high levels of environmental pollution. More than a quarter of the population lives below the poverty line, and the city is making drastic cuts to public services in an attempt to close a $70 million budget deficit.

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