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This semester, take it easy!

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When everybody is going gaga over the semester exams and you’re yet to take a nice look at your course books, here is a piece of advice- It’s OK to be a late starter. For most of us, university exams mean studying 12 days before the day and securing decent marks. This semester is no different. So stop worrying, take a quick look at yourself and face it, these exams are no big deal!

Ten Years to your rescue

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For 2nd and 3rd year students it’s a customary practice to learn the ten years by-heart. As for the freshers, you’ll soon realise the miraculous powers of these holy books for DU students! It’s easy to score decent marks by just going through the past exam papers. Still haven’t bought yours? Go grab them quick.

 

Notes of the most regular student in class

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Needless to say, class notes can do wonders. Also in such little time, it’s a bit difficult to finish the books completely. It’s time to say hi to your new best friend in class (wicked smile!)

Stay away from that friend

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We all have a friend who scares the hell out of us by asking again and again “Kitna hua?” Distance yourself from that friend who has already finished the syllabus thrice and is going to dive in for the fourth time! We don’t need such negativity in life, do we?

Bring out your best hand

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Let’s face it, more than what we write what matters to the examiners is how we write. Your presentation fetches more marks than your content. So make sure your paper is beautifully and neatly written.

Peace-out

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Say goodbye to the world of social media. Avoid parties (obviously, duh!) If social media is a huge distraction for you, become less active for a few days, only then can you concentrate.
Put in your earphones, listen to some music and sit down to begin. Because it’s still okay if you start today! Good luck.
 
Tanya Agarwal
[email protected]
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DUB Speak

5 rock bands that may help you seek solace this exam season!

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Exam season has started and the preparation for the oh-so-dreaded exams is more or less about to begin. (If you’ve already begun with it, I’m going to go ahead and call you a traitor!) Now, amid this mind-numbing preparation period, everyone takes breaks to rejuvenate themselves. And, if you are one of those who turn to music to do the deed, here’s a list of five rock bands that you must try to revamp both, your mood and your playlist!

1. Fall Out Boy

Fall Out Boy is an American rock band formed in 2001. If you imagined rock bands just to be a couple of people, head-banging on ear-piercing music with incomprehensible lyrics, holding bulky guitars, this band may change your perception. The title of their song ‘Where did the party go?’ seems to perfectly reflect the thought of every student swamped with internals and assignments at the moment and may as well turn out to be an interesting listen. Also, their top tracks like light ‘em up, alone together, Uma Thurman and Centuries should not be missed.

Fall out boy
Image credits: http://assets.noisey.com/

 

2. Imagine dragons

You may have heard about them through their much acclaimed single “Demons” and the powerful video that accompanied it. Many put this band in the alternative rock genre but they once said in an interview that, “We don’t want to be a cliché band. We don’t want to restrict ourselves to one genre. We don’t want people to remember us from the genre. We want to let people call our songs as Imagine Dragons’ type songs. So in pursuit of that, we push the boundaries of every genre and try to mix them.” Amazing lyrics, great music, inspiring music videos, this band will provide you with all.

Imagine dragons
Image credits: http://www.billboard.com/

 

 3. Panic! at the Disco (P!ATD)

 This is an American rock band from Las Vegas, formed in 2004. They’re fresh and have a modern appeal. Their songs are so catchy; you’ll end up humming them for weeks. Few of their tracks that you can try are Ballad of Mona Lisa, New perspective and This is Gospel (both the original and acoustic version)

P!ATD
Image credits: http://images2.fanpop.com/

 

 4. Arctic Monkeys

Along with a unique name, this band is famous for their quirky music with lyrics that’ll connect with you in a second. They’re also pretty famous for their ever-so-hot lead vocalist Alex Turner whose voice contains the perfect amount of snotty English accent, which becomes all the more tempting when lazily delivered. Their fifth album ‘AM’ is absolutely the most incredible album of their career comprising of tracks with fascinating titles such as ‘Why’d You Only Call Me When You’re high?’ And ‘Snap out of it’.

arctic monkeys
Image credits: http://40.media.tumblr.com/

 

 5. The Fray

The Fray is an American pop-rock band from Denver, Colorado, formed in 2002. Their songs are ideal for when you’re sitting alone in a peaceful room at night, looking to go on a ride of self-reflection and intense emotions. Their most famous tracks are How to save a life, You found me, Look after you.

The Fray
Image credits : http://www.billboard.com/

 

 

Nishita Agarwal

[email protected]

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DUB Speak

Two Exams, One Day: The Dilemma of the D-Day

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A lot of things change from school to college, but exams and academics remain. In the first semester- with new surroundings, new possibilities and a lot of changes to adjust to- studying understandably, takes a back seat for most students. After a few months of getting used to pretty much an entirely new life, dawn the semester exams and the realisation that university papers, datesheets and exams are another foreign concept and with all the other activities having taken the centre-stage, they were never given much thought. This is enough to make a lot of people worry about the fate of their marks.

This year, a certain group of first-semester students have another dilemma to complicate things further- two exams on the same day. A group of semester 1 students studying B.Com (H) have their papers for Introductory Microeconomics and Financial Accounting scheduled on 26th November. A similar issue was faced by some semester 1 students last year as well when two of their papers were within 24 hours of each other, with Environmental Studies in the afternoon and Mathematical Methods for Economics the next day in the morning.

Naturally, these occurrences cause a lot of anguish to students, but at the same time, they aren’t as uncommon as you may think, with cases like these popping up every few semesters. The only two ways out of this situation are either to notify the authorities and protest against it to get them to change the datesheet, or to deal with it. The latter sounds impossible but really isn’t.

However, it is unfair for the authorities to not be sympathetic to the state of mind of most students around examinations, and not just with respect to less time for dedicated preparation for that subject available to them. It is a general experience that giving an examination is exhausting, and no matter how well or little you slept the night before, you tend to feel drained by the end of the three hours and want to go back to atleast a few hours of relaxation before you start preparing for the next exam. For students to be expected to sit for another examination after a tiring three hours of writing for one, and to be expected to retain everything they studied for both subjects is unfair and something that must be avoided, given that the marks of both subjects count towards the final percentage, and eventually, the overall percentage at the end of all semesters.

It is advisable for the affected party to gather as many voices of support and approach the authorities about the issue and get them to change the datesheet. If that doesn’t happen, then we have our best wishes and the counsel to start studying right away and wrap up preparation before the D-day arrives to offer to them.

Image Credits: www.inmyheadcase.com

Shubham Kaushik
[email protected]

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Admissions 2015

Are Board Exam Results the end of our world? – The harsh story of college admissions in India

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Come May and one can see around is the extravagant anticipation regarding the year’s board results. Every year, the fate of thousands of students is sealed in envelopes stamped upon by vintage authorities who seldom realise the worth of the work they’re doing.

And while the kids develop anxiety disorders hoping to be able to ‘make the cut’, we tend to see reassurances from all around that board exam results are not the end of the world after all. When comedian and celebrity, Vir Das broke the internet with his marksheet; the youth seemed to be infused with an unusual gusto to break away the status quo. However, the question, and a very important one in the Indian society, still stands staring at us- Are Board Exam results really NOT the end of the world?

The answer, sadly, is a big fat no. Because let’s face it, when the nosey aunt shows pity when you just scored a 90% while some Sharma ji’s son managed to score a 98% all you want to do is to get away from the situation as soon as you can. Let’s take a simple example. An author at the age of 17 would not be able to pursue English Honours course in DU’s premier colleges simply because she failed to score a 99% in her board exams; which is the metric for her intelligence and brilliance, isn’t it? Because being an author at such a young age means nothing but messing up that Physics numerical and losing out on a few marks keeps her from attending the best college in the country.

And with this big question follows another big one- Is it fair? And that’s a question all of us know the answer to. Certainly, students who aren’t able to score exceptionally alien 100% scores also make it big in life. But at this point in this developing country, we cannot turn a blind eye to this mismatch. As an observer, one can see aspirants crying when they score a 98.25% because Stephen’s has set its cut off at 98.5%.

With 28 boards running in India, there is no common metric that can keep all students at par. While someone with “mah lyf, mah rulezz” captions is able to score a 95 in English, the other one with “full fathom five thy father lies” cannot climb beyond an 85. So even though the Indian education system runs away from practical knowledge, the system of theoretical knowledge is full of loopholes which indeed make the board result a life changing event for all students.

When we realise the problem of increase in student suicides across the country, why is it so difficult to think of a solution that brings all of us out of this 100% cut-off mesh? Are the students who are not 95% scorers any less deserving than the ones who are? Why are marks solely our judgement metric for a student’s intelligence? Most importantly, why is the flowchart shaped like: Less than 95% is equal to losing out on the country’s best education facilities?

So no matter how much Vir Das or Amitabh Bachchan or Arvind Kejriwal harp about board exam results not being the end of the world, the hard reality is that the status quo points out very different facts which in fact prove the very opposite. And while we’ve all faced it in our lives at some point or the other, there isn’t much that has changed in the Indian Education System in the past three decades.

Acche din might help. We’ll know soon!

Image Credits- mentalhealthy.co.uk

Arushi Pathak
[email protected]

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Bazinga

Bazinga: Delhi University all set to throw an after-exam party

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Disclaimer: Bazinga is DU Beat’s weekly column of almost believable fake news!

In this exam season, students are flipping with exam phobia. Students take to unhealthy living and unhealthy food. They run around while sleeping for 2-3 hours every day or not sleeping at all! Everyone feels the exam heat, and teachers are no exception. Their workload increases and the process of allotting marks and distributing copies can be a tedious one. So this year the Varsity has decided to give a post exam party of sorts where all the teachers, as well as the students can celebrate the end of the exam maha yuddh. The varsity this year had appointed additional squad members to keep an eye on invigilators and supervisors, alike. So with more than required number of teachers in every room no one time had time for breaks, courtesy of exam-malpractices. “Exam time brings with it increased workload for us as well, and this year it was even more so. A party like that would be welcome refreshment”, said a senior official sharing her views on this.

Even more unexpected was where this idea came from which was, if reports are to be believed, from VC Dinesh Singh. Apparently the VC knows when to throw a party. Calling it ‘Exam ke Baad‘ they are planning to have games and few local DJs to turn it up, adding to the fun. The cost for all this is surprisingly economical. The university has tie ups with numerous local ventures and for a contract they have agreed to sponsor the event allowing DU to go forward with negligible cost. Also with most students leaving home for the summer, less turn ups are expected from outstation students. The venue for this has yet to be decided, but it will happen in three or four campuses simultaneously, both South and North. No more details have been given.

Bazinga is DU Beat’s weekly column of almost-believable fake news!

Feature image source: globe-views.com

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DUB Speak

4 things not to do while you plan to ace this semester

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After years and years of planning to start studying well before the exams and failing to do so, cramming at the last hour, and sometimes miraculously scraping through, we’ve all developed our own ‘fundas’ of preparing for examinations. While we all have unique ways of studying that work for us, there are a few ways that usually don’t. Here is a list you should try not to follow if you want to ace this semester:

1.Decide to get organized

This might seem like a good idea, but tidying up your cupboard/ room/ local river in the week before your exams isn’t likely to unclutter your mind, and arranging all your books and notes in neat stacks won’t boost your grades. If you haven’t been organized all through the semester, trying to do it now will only distract you, tire you and waste precious time.

Best case scenario: You now live in more habitable surroundings.

Worst case scenario: You discover an old photo album (let the reminiscing commence).

 
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2.o

 

2.Multi task

You may think that playing Flappy bird and upholding a conversation at the same time makes you a master multi-tasker, but rarely does this skill convert well in terms of actual studying. To be able to really grasp what you’re reading, you need all your concentration and more, especially when there’s only a little time left to cover a lot of syllabus. For some students, studying two subjects alternatively without a sufficient gap works wonderfully, but for most of us, this just muddles things up entirely. Stick to one subject at a time and make sure you don’t move on to something entirely different till you’ve given your mind enough time to soak in what you’ve just studied.

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3.Pull regular all nighters

Sure this works for all people on some nights and for some people on many nights, but don’t fool yourself into thinking that completely disrupting your sleep cycle will lead to any major leap in your scores. If you aren’t typically a creature of the night, then turning nocturnal right before exams is a very bad idea. Staying up all night to study generally leads to increased consumption of caffeine and decreased concentration. Your ability to memorize and recall what you’ve just learnt falls and your mind tires more quickly.

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4.Try to study online

 Because no one really knows how those online notes usually turn into Facebook. And after chatting or aimlessly hitting the news feed button you end up wasting not less than 3-4 hours from your rigorous schedule of last minute studies. So better beware of falling into this trap and stick to the old school method of reading from your books.
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News

Delhi University declares results for FYUP students

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Delhi University declared the result for the examinations held for the first semester in the Four Year Undergraduate Programme (FYUP) on Saturday, the 21st of December. The announcement of the results comes shortly after a fortnight since the examinations ended. This is also the first round of results to have come out for the semester exams held in November and December.

While the results of a total of 42 FYUP courses have been announced, some courses including Journalism and Mass Communication are not present in the list. In order to avoid the crashing server that follow the announcement of all results, the University has hosted the results on three separate servers this time. Only, they still seem to be crashing with students’ attempts to access their results constantly going in vain.

Link to the results servers: Link 1, Link 2, Link 3

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Top Picks

5 things to do in the Post-Exam Break

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After almost a month of last minute cramming, pulling off all nighters (successfully or not) and running on endless caffeine, the post-exam break is now here. Here’s our compilation of the top 5 things to do in it:

1.  Watch Breaking Bad

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You cannot miss this! Watch all the seasons of this amazing TV show called Breaking  Bad, if you haven’t yet. In case you are already done with it, download a TV show which you have been waiting to see all this while but were too lazy to download. Do complete AT LEAST one TV series. Other must-watch shows suggestions include Sherlock (the UK release date of season 3 has been announced as 1st January 2014), Suits, Parks and Recreation and Arrested Development. Even while you are reading this, keep the downloading tab open!

2. Read

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Read everything written by  Gabriel Garcia Marquez and/or Amitav Ghosh. You are going to cherish reading their work and one day, you will be glad that someone gave you this piece of advice. Winter holidays are the best days to have some good reads since you can creep into your blanket with a cup of hot coffee beside you and have a great time while reading.

3. Go for  road trips

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Road trips are fun. Push yourself inside a car with your buddies, keep the music volume high, break the 60km/h or the 80km/h speed limit and see how amazing life can get. This should not be done on busy roads of course. STAY SAFE.

4. Sleep

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Among all the other things, do not forget that this is the only time when you do not have to wake up early for classes and it is going to last only for some days. So sleep as much as you want to. But, remember not to perpetuate yourself into a state of total inactivity.

5.  Experiment with your looks

expectation-new-year-new-look

Let those people who have been seeing you in the same look since like eternity heave a sigh of relief. New looks are usually given the best compliments. Even if you don’t do it for people, do it for yourself. Everybody needs changes. You too. Try while you can.

One last option? Hunt for an internship through our internship updates! With these words, I hope you make your break worth having. Have a good one people! 

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Top Picks

Things to do when you aren’t studying

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Little Black Book Delhi brings DU Beat’s readers something awesome to explore for the fortnight! This week we help you make your exam time a little more fun!

Exams are on our heads. Running around picking up last minutes notes, getting answers photocopied and calling friends to fill in the gaps for classes one did not attend is now a daily routine. And as tensions gets closer and we devour our books one after the other, it is important to take a break and have some food, watch some movies and plan some holidays. This time LBBD brings to you late night food, fashions blogs, free movies to look at and new trips to plan.

Remember all work and no play makes jack a dull boy!

1. Late Night Munchies

Image Credit: Midnight Munchies

Exam times are synonymous with late nights and after a marathon with Marx or Calculus there is no better respite than food. The Bun Butter Chai at Patel Chest will always be a late night haven for people in north while south campus students find solace in filling Parathas at Moolchand {Shah Rukh is a fan too!} and cutting chai at Safdarjung Hospital which is available 24/7. If you are too lazy to step out of your homes, there is Midnight Munchies to get you fresh salads, cup cakes and even paan right to your doorsteps till 4 am! For Gurgoan residents there is Batman Delivers will get you food, cigarettes and contraceptives! If you are looking to cook something on your own, here are a few recipes in 140 characters.

Batman Delivers | https://www.facebook.com/Batmandelivers

Midnight Munchies | https://www.facebook.com/midnightmunching

Recipes | http://littleblackbookdelhi.com/17661/easy-summer-recipes-kishi-arora/

2. Free Movies

theatre

Movies are always a good option to clear one’s head after a long study day. If you are not looking to spend on it, the city has places that bring to you great alternative cinema. In south Delhi there is Habitat Centre, International Centre and Alliance Francaise, which screen documentaries and feature films. CP houses Instituto Cervantes, which screens Spanish feature films, while American Centre shows Hollywood blockbusters regularly.

3. Online Fashion Surfing

fashion-surfing

More than studying for the exams, we tend to scroll down web pages looking at fashion pages. So while one is at it, there are a few one can surely check out. Jamie and Kevin bring to you the absolute crème de la crème of fashion photography. The couple bring to you travel escapades, regal fashion and lifestyle photography.  Fashionista on the other hand provides quick and crisp fashion blogging. Mixing poetry, travel and lots of fashion in one blog is Arathi, the brainchild of Miffalicious.

Jamie & Kevin | http://annstreetstudio.com

Fashionista | http://fashionista.com/

Miffalicious | http://www.miffalicious.com

4. After Exam Plans

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There is nothing better than wondering about how life would have been if there were no exams, especially when they are on our heads. There is the quick getaway to Rajasthan for the serenity of the dessert or the adventurous trip to Rishikesh. Nature lover can choose between wildlife in Kabini and marine life in Havelock Islands {or both!}. There is of course the party place Goa which will never run out of tourists or alcohol. Don’t let Holiday plans this time be confined to dreams or promises made around cup of coffees.

Getaways in December | http://littleblackbookdelhi.com/10650/nye-getaways/

Join us on www.littleblackbookdelhi.com for more of the best of the city! Write to us at [email protected] for any suggestions, recommendations or inputs.

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