11. Student Survival Guide

Practical "survival" skills for university — often overlooked but extremely important.

Course registration

• Read prerequisites / corequisites carefully before registering (see the symbols in Understand the Program).
• Balance each term's load: don't stack too many heavy courses at once.
• Keep your timetable and the registration/adjustment deadlines.

Managing deadlines

• Track every deadline in one place (calendar/Notion/paper).
• Break big tasks down; start early — leaving projects to the last minute is the biggest risk.

Group projects

• Agree on goals, roles, and a Git workflow from the start.
• Each member owns a clear part and can demo their own work.
• Hold short regular meetings; record decisions.

Handling Git conflicts

• Pull/rebase often; commit small with clear messages.
• On a conflict: read the <<<<<<< / ======= / >>>>>>> markers, keep the correct part, and re-test.
• Use branches + Pull Requests instead of pushing directly to the main branch.

→ Detailed Git workflow: DevOps & Research Infra.

How to ask a mentor / lecturer

• Ask good questions: state what you tried, the error, and what you expected (XY problem: ask about the real problem, not just the solution you guessed).
• Provide a minimal, reproducible context (code/logs/screenshots).

How to self-study a hard course

• Break the topic down; learn by doing (mini-projects, exercises).
• Combine multiple sources: course slides, books, videos, official docs.
• Teach it to someone else to check that you truly understand.

FAQ

• I can't pick a direction yet? → Choose Your Direction; build strong foundations first — the direction can change.
• Is passing courses enough? → No. Employers look at projects & skills, not just grades. See the Semester-by-Semester Guide.
• Want to join a lab/research? → Research, Lab & Competitions.
• Is using an AI coding assistant okay? → Use it to learn faster, but understand your code and follow course rules — see Tools & Setup.