Massachusetts Daily Collegian

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A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

A free and responsible press serving the UMass community since 1890

Massachusetts Daily Collegian

iStudiez Pro essential productivity app for students

Most students in college are in desperate need of a dependable, all-encompassing way to organize their lives. While there are many productivity and planner apps available for laptops and smartphones, iStudiez Pro is by far the best. Although it isn’t free, running at just $9.99 for laptops and $2.99 for smart phones in the App Store, it gives comparable apps a run for their money. Here are some of the features that iStudiez Pro offers:

Mike Lau/Flickr

Planner
iStudiez Pro lets you store long-term information about classes and activities by organizing your life by semesters. Within a semester, users add the courses that they are taking, which can then be specialized to include lectures, discussion sections, labs, exams and any other commitments. In this section, users can also add their instructors’ contact information and office hours, as well as additional information like meeting times, building and room numbers and grading information.

Assignments
The best part of iStudiez Pro is that it has a completely comprehensive way of logging assignments. Users can add details about course, due date and priority, and then organize the assignments by this information. Users can also add important notes about assignments. When an assignment is completed, users can enter a grade received for it, which is then automatically calculated into their average based on the grading information entered in the planner.

The only feature that the Assignment section lacks is the ability to mark an assignment as being “in progress,” but users can always keep track of how far they’ve gotten in the notes section.

Day and week overview
iStudiez Pro provides day and week overviews that are simple and easy to view. In the day overview, the program displays all of your classes and commitments for the day – those that have been completed, those that are in progress and those that are still ahead. The day view also displays assignments due that day.

The week overview is similar to the iCal program in Mac OS X. It displays commitments in time blocks, color-coded by course. Double-clicking on an occupied block allows you to view the information about the commitment entered in the planner.

Syncing
If a user purchases multiple versions of the app to use on different devices, information can be synched between them. For instance, if a student is in class, they can add information about an assignment on their phone, and upon returning home to start homework, the information will have synched to their laptop.

For those still skeptical, the App Store provides overviews of the features included in the program, as well as the features added in new versions. Perusing user reviews should convince potential users to invest in the program as well. In addition, the program’s website provides an in-depth explanation of all of its features and how to use them, as well as an FAQ page that answers tricky questions and helps with troubleshooting.

iStudiez Pro is easy to use simply because of the amount of resources it makes available to students in need. It’s an incredible app that is guaranteed to alleviate the stress that managing several classes – and a life outside of class – can generate. In addition, if you’re in desperate need of a productivity app but don’t want to dish out the money for the complete version, the company also offers iStudiez Lite – a free program with many, but not all, of the same features.

Elise Martorano can be reached at [email protected].

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    TSNov 7, 2013 at 6:30 pm

    And they are preparing update for iOS 7, waiting so long, so excited!!!!! Love the app!

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