Students and their families do months of research before choosing just the right college, but once they're on campus, how many students research the professors who are teaching their classes? To optimize your college education you need to find your school's best teachers, but how?
What Every College Student Should Know is a comprehensive guide to discovering the best teachers at your school and learning everything you can from them. Throughout the book, case studies are provided to give you vivid, real-life examples of how to put these ideas into practice. Here, the unique writing combination of a professor and a student provides you with perspectives from both sides of the equation. You'll learn:
-- What resources to check and what questions to ask in selecting an instructor
-- How to evaluate professors based on the first class sessions
-- What to look for in a syllabus and grading policies
-- The importance of instructor feedback and accessibility
Ernie Lepore and Sarah-Jane Leslie reveal strategies to maximize your classroom experience, such as:
-- How to identify a professor's teaching style and expectations and how to adapt to them
-- Ways to get a teacher to notice you and take an interest in your learning experience
Even the most outgoing students can expect only limited contact with their professors in the classroom, so the authors also provide tactics to take full advantage of meetings outside of regular class time, such as:
-- How and when to approach an instructor
-- How to prepare for the meeting
-- Ways to phrase questions to get the answers you need
-- The benefits of making at least one followup visit to teachers after the semesterends
-- Advice on how to review your exam or paper with your professor
-- Ways to build up your relationship and get invaluable feedback on your work
-- Tips on how to get the best recommendations from professor

Acknowledgments
Introduction: Why Students Need This Book
1. Before Classes Begin: Finding Good Teachers
2. In the Classroom: Getting the Most our of Good Teachers
3. Outside the Classroom: Cultivating Relationships with Good Teachers
4. After Class: Building on Relationships with Good Teachers
5. The Ins and Outs of Recommendations
Afterword: Why Bad Teaching Persists
A Guide to Academic Vocabulary

Ernie Lepore is the director of the Center for Cognitive Science at Rutgers University as well as a professor in the philosophy department.

Sarah-Jane Leslie, a student in the Rutgers University Honors Program, is a National Merit Scholar and has been elected to Phi Beta Kappa.