Finals week is around the corner, and with the tests, projects, and essays comes a packed library and a lot of stressed out people. In order to help your fellow students keep their sanity, here are a few guidelines to follow. **

1. Turn down your music That person with incredibly loud music coming from their headphones is an absolute staple during finals week. As luck would have it, they never seem have good taste in music, either. It’s always hard to know if they don’t understand that it is possible for the music from their headphones to be heard by other people, or if they really just don’t care. At any rate, do not be that person.

2. Put your phone on silent Silent. Not vibrate. Silent. Especially if you get texts from GroupMe. Spare us.

3. Stop coughing so loud I should qualify this statement. I’m not talking about the occasional cough that cannot be stopped. I’m talking about the intense, unnecessarily loud, almost angry sounding cough that occurs frequently. Not only is it distracting, but the people around you will constantly wonder when the next horrible cough is coming.

4. Stop having an extensive conversation with your friend Finals can be a time for bonding. We commiserate. We console. We even try and one up each other with just how horribly we have managed our time: “I am definitely going to fail, I have a fifteen page research paper due tomorrow and I haven’t even come up with a thesis.” “Don’t even talk to me about failing, I have three exams and two essays due in the next three days.” This talking can be helpful to get off our chests come finals week, but it can also be decidedly annoying for everyone else to have to listen to. Keep this to Co-op and remote areas, please 😉

5. Stop having an extensive whispering conversation with your friend. Whispering makes it worse.

6. Minimize chomping, chewing, and crinkling. Food can be a helpful boost for a tough night, but that doesn’t mean you can do whatever you want. If you must bring your food to a work area, please be cognizant of those around you and keep the chomping to a minimum. If you have a bag of chips or pretzels, you should be extremely careful when you reach your hand in to grab more. Nothing derails an essay like excessive crinkling.

**Full disclosure: I have been guilty of failing to follow each and every one of these