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Fay Blue
Fred Fregoso
Harvey Rosales

Going out on a Budget

Exams
Eating on a budget

Elizabeth Velazquez

Shopping on a budget

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Going out on a Budget

The weekend has finally arrived and all of your friends are sending you what seems like an endless array of text
messages asking what essentially amounts to the same question: Do you want to hang out? and of course you want to
hang out with your friends! But you find yourself in a bit of a conundrum. You are on a budget and from the looks of the 5
dollars sitting pretty in your wallet (half of which is made up of change you found between your couch cushions) its a
very tight budget. What are you going to do? Your social life has essentially met its untimely demise, right?
Well dear reader that is where you are wrong! Do not fret, there are plenty of things you can do with friends on a
tight budget. Some activities wont even cost you a single cent. Here are five ways you can hang with the gang:
1. Have a Potluck Picnic at the Park
Why eat alone when you can eat with friends at the park? You were going to have lunch on your own any
way. By making your noon meal time into a food gathering, not only will you be able to have a great time
hanging out with your friends but you will also get to partake in some yummy food you wouldnt have
been able to eat otherwise. You might even get to meet some really cute dogs!
2. Have a Movie Night at Your or Your Friends House
One of the best luxuries available in the modern age is the ability to watch movies within the comfort of
your own home. You could watch horror movies, or rom-coms, or even better, silly B movies that are so
bad they are good. Pair this with a 5-dollar pizza from Little Caesars and you are sure to have plenty of
laughs and a very good time with your friends!
3. Go to the Mall and Window Shop
Why not just spend the day at the mall with your friends? You all can go window shopping, try on
outrageously priced outfits youd probably never buy, test out the Seen-on-TV products people try to sell
you from those tiny stalls, or grab a cheap meal at the food court.
4. Try on Clothes at a Thrift Shop
Just like the mall crawl of the 90s the same can be applied to thrift stores. But instead of trying on
designer clothes, your selection will be far more dated and perhaps a bit silly. Go ahead, try on all those
oversized sweaters with the shoulder pads sewn in or the MC Hammer pants of your fathers youth. The
best part is that most thrifts stores (unlike many stores within a shopping mall) do not mind you taking
photos of you and your friends trying on clothing so be sure to document your fun outing!
5. Explore the Wonders of the Internet
Do not forget that the Internet is also available to you and your friends. Aside from streaming movies and
online shopping the internet is also home to an almost endless amount of coupons and information about
free/cheap events happening near you. You can find discounts for restaurants, tickets to the movies, and
even to places like the bowling alley or a local arcade. Depending on the time of year some fairgrounds
offer free admission just for showing up on opening day.
So remember, just because you are a bit strapped for cash at the moment does not mean that you cannot have fun
with your friends! The world is your proverbial oyster, just do not forget your
-Fay Blue
coupons!

Exams
Exams; the epitome of what all premeds work tirelessly to everyday to do well on. It doesnt matter if the exam
is intro to biology or the MCAT, how you prepare on both a mental and physical level will ultimately determine your
success. Seeing that we are a little over midway of the spring semester, I assume we all had one sort of exam in our
classes and have experienced the stress that comes in preparing and striving for that A. First and foremost, formulating
a plan of attack will help you keep on track in terms of chapters/homework/or lecture notes to study from on certain
days of the week and, if you are pressed for time, the exact time you will be studying a certain type of material. By
having your study plan staring at you through your calendar or planner, you will be more likely to complete your to-do
list and feel accomplished in the end of the day instead of stressed on thinking if you should keep going or not. A good
app that I find useful to plan my studies is Wunderlist. You can have this app remind you what you need to study and
when you are done with a specific task, you can check it off and it transfers towards your completed task. This way,
you are able to have a check list and feel accomplished when you see your completed tasks list grow! Having a
planner is also a good way to keep track on your assigned work that is due on certain days. For example, when I
acquire all the syllabi from my classes, I go through all of the exam, quizzes, paper, presentation, etc. due dates and
mark then down on my calendar. This general skeleton of your due dates help you plan accordingly weeks in advance
in terms of how much studying you should devote if you have multiple exams in the span of a week or days.
In terms of the physical portion, most pre-med students do not pay attention to this part since they either study than
exercise (which is totally fine). However, as pre-meds, we do stress almost every week and for some, every day. Stress releases the
hormone cortisol that can have deleterious affects to your well being if in high levels. With exercise, you are not only distressing
by reducing your cortisol levels, but you also release epinephrine that gives you a feel good sensation and come on, who
wouldnt want that? In addition to all these hormones, exercising help deplete free fatty acids that are roaming around your
blood stream from the food youve been eating throughout the day and lets be honest, we do not all eat like angels. By
decreasing the amount of fatty acids in the bloodstream, you decrease your chances to in having a heart attack from
accumulation of fats.
All in all, keeping a solid schedule and distressing by any means you deem worthy will help you achieve your academic
goals and altogether, a better outlook on your pre-med journey.

-Fred Fregoso

Eating on
a Budget
College is an institution that allows young adults to
explore lifestyles and learn about their social environment. As
students seeing themselves in the field of medicine, we often
enough ignore our well beings in favor for long term goals such
as good grades in classes and social interactions with fellow
classmates. According to the Journal of Nutrition Education and
Behavior, they identified that 59% of students have a food
insecurity in comparison to 27% of poor citizens that rely on
emergency food from donations. Why?
The most common reason is that students are busy juggling their lives with school and their outside extracurricular activities.
Students are pressured to priorities their studies at the same ignore their health especially eating properly. Majority of students skip
their meals in favor for more time in their busy lives which is in fact a bad habit to have. Furthermore, college students also have to
deal with food expense that persuades them to eat unhealthy fast foods such as McDonalds and Panda Express. However, there are
many alternatives that college students can take to eat healthier at the same have is time efficient. In the following below, here are
some tips that can improve your eating habits in college

1. Buy containers such as Tupperware, and use the microwaves around campus.
There are many microwaves around campus solely for students to use. They are a great asset for any college students as it allows you
to buy healthier food with better nutritional value than fast foods that can be microwaved with ease. Furthermore, they are great to
have for students who live in the dorms without a kitchen and do not use the meal plans.
2. Read the nutrient facts in the backside of food products
Often enough, the food that you eat with a high price tag, more importantly junk food, will actually contain less calories even if it
makes you feel full. The nutritional facts will allow you to make smarter grocery purchases and show numerical evidence of a food
product that your buying is worth the price.
3. Plan and prep meals daily
The most difficult task to do and obvious to suggest for a busy college student. My advice is to create a habit of preparing food every
day, as the benefits are immense. Preparing meals save lot money and allow you to control what you eat. Cook in large portions so
that you always have leftovers for your following busy days.
4. Buy in bulk and during the seasons
Most carbohydrates food products such as rice and oats can save you a lot of money. For builders, protein shake bundles should be
priorities as it also allows you to concentrate at what you are trying to shape your body. During seasons, local produce is generally
cheaper and coupons for them will increase in growth. They are also generally nutritious than other products
-Harvey Rosales

Shopping on a Budget
New clothes? Who doesnt like to go
out and spoil themselves every here and
there? But sometimes it is not that easy. Being
that we are pre-med our future and present
school will cost a pretty penny. But, how do you
get to go out to buy new clothes for the year?
Or when it comes to Christmas season or
birthday? Well, one thing is to put aside some
money throughout. But now we have a lot of
great ways and chances to save money. A lot of
stores do Price Match now. What this means
is that if you find the same product in another
store for a cheaper price you can simply show
it to the cashier and they will give you the
product for that price. To help you out with
this there are a few different apps you can
download onto your phone to search through hundreds of stores to find the cheapest price. My personal favorite
app to help me with price matching is called ShopSavvy. As soon as you open the app you find a lot of offers from
different stores that can help you find great deals for whatever it is youre looking for. There are also different
offers on the bottom middle of the page indicated by a small green square with a barcode. By clicking that
barcode, you open a scanner that allows you to scan the barcode of your desired product and automatically
searches through different online stores and stores near you for a better price.
As well as price matching there are numerous stores that allow you to purchase virtually anything on the
stores website or in the store itself. Some stores that allow you to do this would be: Kohls, Victoria Secret / Pink,
etc. These, and many other stores, offer the option to apply for a credit card for this store. When purchasing
things with your credit card you begin to accumulate points that you can later cash in for cash back coupons or
mailed coupons and deals throughout the year with specials that they will be having. If you have enough points
accumulated, you can even use your bonus cash back with the deals and combine them for an extra saving! You can
save any where from 10% to possibly even 60% or more.
Just because we are college pre med students does not mean we have to hold back. We get good grades and
participate in multiple different things. So yes, I believe every here and there we deserve some time to spoil
ourselves with out breaking our bank.

-Elizabeth Velazquez