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March 2022

Welcome to another edition of the Learning Resource Center's monthly newsletter, Matadors! We hope you all had a great first quarter of the semester. It has been so nice to see students bustling around campus and even coming in for in-person tutoring!

Read below to find out what's new at the LRC!

We’ve added a new section to our newsletter called “The Fountain of Knowledge” where we share a variety of study skills and writing tips from our wonderful tutors at the LRC. We hope you enjoy these tips and share them with your peers and students (there’s also a special surprise at the end!)

Have a great month! Be safe and well,
The LRC Team

New & Coming Soon

Notice on upcoming closures:
- All of our services will be closed March 21-27 for Spring Break. The Main Office will be fully virtual for the entire week.
- We will be fully closed on Thursday 3/31 in observance of Cesar Chavez Day.
Conversation Language Swap returns Friday, March 11th at 1:30pm on Zoom!
Faculty: Help the Writing Center better prepare for your students by uploading course documents that you feel may assist us as we get ready to help your students, including prompts, examples of what you're looking for in your students' work, and more!
Prompt Feedback: We have created a new submission form for Prompt Feedback to help increase the accessibility of the form itself.

Visit our updates page for more detail!
Note: You can now find an archive of past newsletter editions through the link above.

We have a new staff member!

Meet Andrea Cabadas, the new SI Coordinator at the LRC! She is a CSUN graduate with an MS in Kinesiology emphasizing in Biomechanics. She first began tutoring in the math department’s tutoring center and quickly became an SI leader. She was an SI leader for over 7 years and worked closely with her predecessor. She loves going to the gym and cooking. On the weekends you can find her at an aquarium or a brewery to wind down from her week. On any given day she’s about 40% coffee, 40% bread, and 20% good vibes.

Upcoming Events

Click on an event to go directly to the registration page.

General Reading and Writing Workshops:
DISH Sessions & Workshops for Graduate Students:
- Literature Review - 3/11 @ 12pm
- Utilizing Your Chair/Committee - 3/18 @ 12pm
Conversation Swap Language Exchange is every Friday at 1:30pm

Check out our events calendar to stay up to date with all LRC events!

Fountain of Knowledge: Preparing for Midterm Season

Read below for some tips and tricks from our fabulous tutors at the LRC!

The phone buzzes, another email notification that Canvas is down. The lines at Freudian sip reach out the door as CSUN students and faculty line up for their third fill of the day. Suddenly your favorite study spot on the second floor of the library has been overtaken by a study group. Chills go down the spine and goosebump creeps up on your flesh – is it the wind? No. It’s midterm season.

Have no fear. Our tutors know the midterm jitters like the back of their hands and chugged six shots of espresso in one sitting (it’s all part of the college experience, right?). We’ve gathered some tricks of the trade from our tutors and want to share them here, from how to study for midterms, to the best study spots on campus. Sit back, take some notes and maybe order decaff next time on your coffee run.

Talia Kokonian, a psychology tutor in our SMART Lab shares her best tips for studying:

“I recommend a few things: having a safe space to do work, taking notes, and flashcards…this helps me prepare for any upcoming exam and helps me retain the most important information.”

Picture this (or not): The words “midterm” and “essay” happen to be in the same canvas post. Suddenly your “oh-so clever” brain has betrayed you and wiped out all memory of how to even start an essay let alone brainstorm. Panic strikes. What do you do next?

Take a deep breath. Look at your assignment, and just let the whirlwind of your thoughts flow out onto a piece of paper. There are no bad ideas. As Talia says, “Whether that idea may or not be useful, it could possibly help in another assignment, which is why I do my best to not discard any ideas right away.”

"Brainstorming is like mind-mapping your ideas," shares Cynthia Olmos, a Lower-Division Consultant, who loves to help students brainstorm.

Brainstorming is such a radical experience that it’s important to remember it can happen in any time at any place. In the words of our Mildred Fuentes-Chung our wonderful Upper-Division Consultant who says it best “brainstorming doesn’t just happen on paper, it also happens aloud, when you interact with others in conversation, or internally when you're reflecting. Sometimes you come up with new ideas through lived experiences.”

Now that we have you covered on how to brainstorm and some useful study tips, here’s a list of the best campus spots to study, tried and true from our tutors.

3rd floor of the University Library (the same floor where you can find our tutors, wink wink)

Individual study rooms you can book here at the University Library
CSUN Pride Center
Anywhere near a Freudian Sip (for fuel of course)

With this we bid you adieu and happy midterms! Please enjoy these pictures of some of the LRC's extended family:

by Gillian Moran-Perez, Upper Division Writing Consultant

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