At the beginning of the year, I made a resolution to start being more organized with my notes. With the help of Microsoft OneNote, I can succeed in my goal.   

To be frank, last semester my notebook was a wreck. I took a ton of classes, and I had no real organizational system set up. Work notes, class work, and even personal items were all thrown into a binder, and I would sort through the mess to piece together study material. I would sometimes have to reach out to friends in my class and ask for their notes.   

I would spend hours typing out my notes into Word to digitize them. This was my first step into trying to be more structured, but by the end of the night my hand was cramping from all the extra typing. I didn’t feel like I was getting anywhere with my schoolwork. It was a struggle, until I found OneNote.   

Microsoft OneNote is a digital note-taking app that keeps everything in one place and organized. Every time you create a new notebook it is automatically organized with sections that can be color coordinated, renamed and moved around to fit your workflow.  This software gives us the users endless page space to write, draw, and even record content.  

OneNote made it super easy to keep my classes organized. I can share my notebooks with classmates, and they can add onto the notes for optimal learning experiences.  Revising notes is a breeze because you and classmates can highlight the important things and even leave ink annotations anywhere on the screen.  

OneNote is more than just a tool for schoolwork; it can used for your everything life. I have one for work and another for my side hobbies where I can keep track of things I’ve created and schedule out my weekends. From recipes to to-do lists, the options are endless of what OneNote can do.  

The best thing about using OneNote is that it is free. In fact, the whole Microsoft 365 suite is free for faculty, staff and students to use. You can learn more about these services on the UAB IT website.