As the semester is beginning to come to a close, the need for social support is increasing. With the amount of stress and homework coming up, surrounding yourself with supportive friends is incredibly important. Allowing others to help you through whatever you are going through can be difficult, but it is extremely important.

College is the perfect time to develop your social support system. Joining organizations, making friends in your classes, and talking to people in your neighborhood are all places to find friends. Professors and advisors are also wonderful resources to go to for advice concerning career and academic choices. As we have discussed before, maintaining relationships with your professors throughout the semester can be tremendously helpful for many reasons.

Creating friends in your classes will allow you to not only have notes and study partners, it will provide you with an increased sense of community within your classroom. Having friends in a class is a great motivator to go to class, as you want to be a part of a group and the memories that are created during a class. Being able to share thoughts on how the class is going, discuss the test and what you have studied allows you to reap the benefits of being in a group. For instance, having people write notes on different chapters of the book can make the readings seem a lot less stressful when you don’t have as much to read over.

Having a support system has many benefits. Those in your support system can help you handle the difficult situations you may encounter throughout your time in college and in life. They can also help you find resources within the college that you might not have known about. One of the most important benefits of having a social support system is that they will keep you motivated.

Staying motivated throughout the semester can be increasingly difficult as assignments and projects start to pile up. Having a network of friends that will encourage you to not procrastinate and work hard to accomplish your tasks is a key to success in classes for many people. It is rather easy to lose motivation throughout the semester, but having a social support system that is constantly pushing you to do your best in your classes can be helpful.

Utilizing your support system can be more difficult if you are especially shy, or reluctant to ask for help. However, utilizing your group as accountability partners that will motivate you to do your work and stay on top of everything can be very useful. They can also help you through any emotional, relational, or social issues that you are dealing with. Reaching out to ask for help can be as simple as requesting to chat, or asking someone to check in with you periodically to make sure that you are actually doing homework.

There are several organizations that can help you build your social support network. Organizations such as the following are great places to start:

• Aggie Mental Health Ambassadors, https://amhatamu.wixsite.com/website
• Texas A&M Psychology Club, http://www.tamupsychclub.com/
• Psi Chi International Honor Society for Psychology, http://www.tamupsychclub.com/psi-chi.html

If you are looking for something different, the Student Activities website can be very helpful in finding an organization that meets your needs. Check out their website here: https://studentactivities.tamu.edu/.