Underclassmen, we’re talking to you right now. That time of the year is creeping up on us, and we’re almost ready to choose our classes for next year. While you may think you know what classes you want to be in, chances are you’ll change your mind. Here are some tips to keep yourself out of the counselor’s office next year.

• What are you interested in doing with your life? Take classes that will help you with your career aspirations. Hopefully, you’ll like those classes so you won’t need to switch out.
• Don’t take classes that your friends are in. High school is temporary and most of the time, so are your friends. Don’t choose classes based on what your friends are choosing.
• Branch out. Try a pathway that you haven’t taken any classes in yet. Have you spent all of high school taking business classes? Take ceramics or painting, and give your brain some free time to think abstractly.
• Don’t fill your schedule with six advanced placement classes. You’ll hate yourself.
• At the same time, don’t fill your schedule with easy classes. Challenge is good. You still need to grow academically. Don’t waste four years of your life.
• Math is not always stupid, and you will in fact face times in your life that you will need to know how to find the angle of a hypothetical triangle.
• Start thinking about college, and look at what classes you need to be considered for admission at your dream university. A lot of them are expecting two years of a foreign language nowadays.
• Look at what else we have on this handy page for you so you’ll know other information, such as how to be a Kansas Scholar, and what to look forward to when you’re a junior or senior.