How much free time does computer science have?

 Many students ask if computer science majors have free time or not?

In this article, we will give an example of a computer science daily routine to see how much free time he has.

Also, discovering the free time activities that most computer science students do in their spare time.

How much free time do computer science students have?

Here is an example of a daily routine of a first-year computer science student, he say:

Waking up at 7 am

The first thing I do is wake up early a little bit. Normally my classes are at 9 am. But I wake early to prepare myself and do some lighter homework tasks, so in detail i:

==> wake up at 7 pm

==> pack my bed

==> packing may bed

==> preparing coffee and breakfast that take me 20 minutes

==> take a breakfast 30 minutes

so, after all, get prepared for doing 1 hour of homework that we will demonstrate in the next paragraph.

8 am do homework

Typically 1 hour is not enough to do homework, but I just take this one hour to revise and prepare for the following lecture that I study in a day.

For instance, when I have linear algebra, I revise and take the basics of the Fourier series(math lecture in linear algebra). So I do a kind of revision to have some background before I go to class. This helps so much when getting to class.

9-11 am go to college

9 am when my class starts, so I go to college where I usually spend 2 to 3 hours in the morning. In this example, I showed that I have 2 hours, but sometimes I have 3 hours of morning lectures.

11-1 am go back home and prepare for lunch

at 11 I prepare for lunch, sometimes I prepare my own lunch and some other times I get my lunch outside. Normally I take lunch at noon. I take my time for lunch. I usually spend 1 hour.

As a result, I finish between 12.30 pm to 1 am

1-3 pm college lectures

I go back to college and attend classes. Attending classes is very important because I see some students skipping classes. But I don’t do that at all.

you can read this article Do professors care if you skip classes(6 things to know)

3-5 workout

I go to the gym daily. Between 3 to 4 am is my daily routine time when I start a gym. Workout for me is essential. It helps relieve the stress of classes and stay focused during lectures.

I finish the gym at 4.30 pm. It takes 30 to walk from my gym to a dorm.

Honestly, I love this 30 minutes of walking, especially when I put on my earbuds and listen to music on the road. It’s a blessing.

If you ask if you should have headphones or earbuds for walking, this article is for you.

Students should walk with headphones or earbuds?

5-6 pm dinner

So I usually get to a house at 5 o’clock when I start preparing my dinner. I typically prepare lunch and dinner together to save some time. But sometimes I don’t find time to do that.

Generally, I take one hour from 5 to 6 am to eat dinner while watching tv.

6- 9 pm studying

It is an interesting moment where I m focused on my studies, so I do all my homework like:

  • revise my notes that I took for a daily class
  • doing my assignments
  • noting the question that I don’t understand to ask a professor later

But on a Friday and Saturday, I spend these 3 hours playing video games with myself and sometimes with my colleagues. It is an interesting moment when I chill out and relieve all week’s stress.

you can read this article

Playing video games in college is a good idea?

9-10 pm read in a bed

at 9, I prepare myself to go to bed by washing my teeth and packing my next day’s book lectures. But before, I read on my bed using kindle paperwhite for 30 to 45 minutes.

I don’t use my phone to read. I use an amazon paperwhite for reading because it has many advantages, you could check them in this article below.

12 important facts about kindle paperwhite for students

So to sum up as a comptuer science student, you will have between 3 to 4 as a spare time if you don’t work a part-time job.

10 activities that computer science students do in their free time?

1 – play sport

Computer science is the most demanding major. It contains a lot of math. So, where is math going the stress will be. The only method to relieve this stress is to play sports.

So choose a sport that suits you and practice, if you do that daily it will be very helpful in your studies.

2 – play video games

Playing video games in college is a good idea

Thre is not a problem to play some video games or bring some consoles like Nintendo Switch or Xbox. It will be amusing to play with them in some spare time like on cold or rainy days.

you could read this related article about that topic:

Bring Nintendo switch to college or school (11 Facts)

Bring Nintendo switch to college or school (11 Facts)

You just have to be careful to respect your study times. But if you feel that you are weak to resist in front gaming console is better to stay away and do something else.

3 – learn some coding languages, especially c and c++

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The valuable thing, especially for comptuer science first-year students to learn c and c++. 

C is the base language where programing was built, so don’t listen to people saying C is old or difficult. Go and take a course in it.

In the computer science course, you will study c++, so it is better to have previous knowledge before taking it in class.

4 – improve yourself in math like calculus

The other helpful thing if you like to work on yourself is to reinforce yourself in calculus.

Calculus is the most complicated math subject in comptuer science, so if you prepare yourself by doing additional studies, it will be beneficial.

Most computer science colleges student studies a lot of calculus in the first year. While the majority of stem students drop out because of calculus. Here are some numbers know about computers science majors.

  • comptuer science major is the first drop rate major in America with 9.8%
  • 33% of computer science students drop out in the first year

if you find some struggles is better to go and check some calculus courses. You could use the Briliant or khan academy.

5 – socialize with friends

there is no better to hang out with good friends than doing multiple activities, especially playing some sport like soccer or any other types of team sports.

6 – go and look for internships

The other great thing to do is to look for an internship. As a result, it is useful and helps you create a good network.

It increases the odds and chances of getting a job when you graduate fastly than your peers.

7 – Studying a foreign language

Learning foreign languages like Spanish is essential. It will help to communicate with different cultures. It is a good idea, primarily to communicate with the Mexican population.

It could be useful for you if you think of working as a freelancer. Having multiple languages is practical and helpful in freelancing.

8 – work part times jobs

working a part-time job is necessary, especially if you are from a middle or poor-class family. Getting a computer science degree will not be cheap. You will probably have $100,000 of debt to repay.

So getting some additional bucks will be helpful to pay back your loans. If you think about that and don’t have the experience, you could read this article.

Working while in college for stem major(5 tips to know)

9 – look for a mentor to guide you

Finding a mentor is the most primordial part of life. The first thing you should do is figure out what you want to be in life.

The second thing that will give a shortcut is finding a mentor or model person you will be inspired by. Most successful people have mentors in their lives.

10 – do some freelancing work

if you have some skills and probably you should have in programming, you can do some freelancing jobs. It is not required to be a programmer you can do anything you feel you are good at that people can benefit from.

yassin.ajanif

Yassin ajanif is a physics graduate and electromechanical engineer width more than 5 years in the field. My goal and my team are to share our experience to help you succeed in your career as a stem major. we talk about all tips, problems, and struggle STEM students face in their career and how to overcome them.