➪ Countdown to 1A

This is the trickiest one to write about. A few months from now, you'll be finishing high school (or have already). You write that last exam on a beautiful summer afternoon. By then, you have your acceptance and you have nothing else to worry about. The last few months of anxiously waiting for university acceptances, keeping up an average to maintain your entrance scholarships are finally over. You just want to unwind, travel, hang out with your friends and catch up on sleep.

Hold it right there.

You're going to UWaterloo. To the math faculty, to be more specific. If you're expecting 1A to be a joyride, you're very much mistaken.

Please do not waste your summer.

Learn a new programming language (you don't appreciate the importance of being acquainted with other programming languages till you start applying for jobs), brush up on your calculus or take some online courses (Udacity, Coursera, CodeAcademy, Udemy etc). But don't just laze around for the next 3 months.

When I was in your position, I asked a couple of upper year students the same questions. I received mixed responses (go to reddit, and you'll find plenty of responses to this question). Some told me to enjoy the last peaceful summer I'll get before university. Others gave me a list of things to do.

If you agree with the former response, I won't disagree with you there. It's absolutely true that this is the last 'actual' (i.e. the kind that is defined by the term 'luxurious') summer you'll be blessed with in perhaps a long time. But at the same time, this might also be the only period of your life where you're not being hounded by responsibilities (none of us have a mortgage to pay off, or start a college fund for our kids etc). Utilize that to the best of your abilities.

For those of you in CS, you might have had heard about the importance of side projects. Those don't just spring up overnight. They need time, motivation and energy; things that you'll have an ample supply off during the summer break. And whatever you do, don't put off side projects, hoping to start working on them 'soon'. A tried and tested technique, that is not the way to go. Christmas break after 1A is spent stressing over your exam results, and catching up on sleep that you've sorely lacked for the past 4 months. They'll be numerous websites and blogs dedicated to giving out ideas over how to utilize your summer, so I'm not going to re-iterate those. But do keep in mind that this may be the most casual summer break you might get for a long time to come.