Seven Things You Should Know Before High School

You're way past primary colors and fat pencils, but admit it: the start of a new school year is something of a curve ball. That goes double for starting a new school - HIGH SCHOOL, yet. Don't freak - here are seven survival tips you'll be glad to know

1. Don't buy clothes until after school starts.

It never fails; somebody decides THURSDAY IS EVERYTHING PURPLE DAY or YOU HAVE TO HAVE YELLOW HIGH TOPS (or gray flats, or cut the sleeves off your shirt, or whatever) and unless you do the deciding at your school, you won't get the memo until after the first week of class. Plus, you'll probably just wear shorts the first week anyway, and everything goes on sale after Labor Day. Shopping can wait.

2. Take gym in summer school if you can.

Here's one of those completely-unfair-totally-true things that nobody tells you (until now): gym is the only summer school class that's really a blast. Gym during the school year means, first of all, it's in a gym - which is where dodge ball and lame free-throw shooting drills happen. (Borrrrring!) The summer version of gym, however, might mean tennis, bowling, golfing, kayaking, and other things that are infinitely more fun than calisthenics or anything you can do in a gym. Plus, if you don't have to take gym during the school year, you'll never have to figure out what to do if somebody takes your underwear and flushes it in the toilet while you're in the shower. Just sayin.'

3. The bigger the backpack, the better.

More room is more room. Period.

4. Your phone will fall into enemy hands.

So ask your cell phone service provider to make a back-up of your contacts if possible, and get in the habit of erasing texts you've sent if you don't want everyone to read them. Obviously, the same goes for pictures.

5. College applications are important now. Seriously. Yes, NOW.

It's not fair, but it's true. Everything about your academic performance matters in high school. College apps don't just make students crazy, they put parents in a panic too. Breathe deeply and do your best. In every class, in every subject, every day. Sorry. This is why they call it your high school CAREER - because it matters. If you can't be serious about your high school performance, start practicing how to say, "do you want fries with that?" in a sincere and helpful tone of voice. Because the competition for fast-food jobs is almost as crazy as the race to get into the "best" school.

6. Coaches don't really hate you. Much.

But their jobs depend on having players who are absolutely, positively, prepared for anything. Whether your sport is soccer or skydiving, basketball or basket-weaving, you will be expected to work hard in the weight room, run a mile (or a marathon) and drop and give 'em twenty anytime you get caught smirking during practice. Get used to it; it's part of the fun. Or at least, it will seem that way by your 10-year reunion.

7. Get over-involved.

Here's the worst advice you'll ever get about high school: "If you're too busy, you won't have time to goof off and enjoy yourself." Fact: there's no such thing as too busy. Write for the school paper, get a job, try out for the play, if you don't make it join stage crew, volunteer at the food bank, get another job, run for class officer, get (or be) a peer tutor, and attend every game, dance, walk-a-thon, and sort-of-lame-sounding event that's going on. See, most of those things are just a more interesting way of goofing off and enjoying yourself. Bonus: when you're involved in almost everything, not only will you know almost everything about your high school, almost everyone will know you - in a good way! So get over-involved; it will almost guarantee that you'll have fun.

And now that you know some of really important things about high school survival, relax. A little bit. Or - perhaps this is the best advice of all -  learn to enjoy the stress. After all, high school will be over before you know it. Have fun with it!

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This article was originally published in Yahoo! Voices, a now-defunct channel of the Yahoo.com family of websites and other experiments. Surprisingly, my byline hasn't changed a lot since it first appeared. (I'm sure I haven't either.) I still bring 20+ years of marketing, communications and operational management experience to every assignment...even high school.

Copywriter Crib Notes - this week's roundup

I have a habit of writing things on scraps of paper.

Notice I didn't say "bad" habit. The tendency can make me appear a little scatterbrained/disorganized at times, but it has some redeeming traits.

Like, having notes nearly covering my desk, I rarely have to dust it.  <BaDaDUM> Ironically, the majority of those little scraps of paper contain notes I've taken from some website or other. Yes, I know all about bookmarks and my (computer) desktop is littered with links to things to read later (or again) and I even have and use an electronic "notes" program. On my computer and my phone.

It's not that I'm a hopeless luddite. I'm not addicted to paper. I'm just an old-fashioned note-taker. I've found, when I write something down, with a real pen or pencil, on a piece of real paper, I process it better and retain it longer than when I try to absorb something from the screen.

But enough about me.

Below, some of the best writing tips I picked up - and promptly scrawled on scraps of paper - this week. I hope they're helpful to you. If they are, tweet about it, share this post or ... scribble it on a piece of note paper.

Who knows? Maybe when you clean up your desk you'll find a blog post amongst those scraps of paper.

> Use your Twitter background image to promote products!  (Thank you, @ShannonKSteffen! and hello, Whydidn'tIthinkofthat Hall of Fame.)

> The first one of these 8 tips I wrote down was #3. The other 7 are pretty good too! 

> OK I didn't exactly write any of this down - I enjoyed the article so much I printed it. And that's serious. As in, that's how you create good content serious. Kudos to Kuno. 

Hm. That's about it for writing tips on my desk this week. As I cleaned up my desk I realized that a lot of those scraps of paper are recipes and grocery lists. Food for thought, as they say. :D

Kerpoof! You're an author!

Kerpoof is one of my new favorite sites for budding authors. The Disney-owned site is surprisingly non-commercial, and it's really and truly FREE to use. The registration process requires a parent's email but in my experience, I can honestly say I haven't noticed any spam as a result of our use.

Why I like it: the storybook feature gives kids a chance to create their own illustrated books online, and as a bonus, they're getting great keyboard practice at the same time.

If you need to take your kid to the office this summer, I highly recommend sitting them at the keyboard and sending them to Kerpoof. Then, make sure you take a break to read what they're writing. You just might find you've got a talented writer in the family, and the next thing you know, you'll be sending out query letters and learning all about the publishing industry.

Hey, worse things could happen. :D

~Diane Stresing