Many high school students engage in some sort of fitness-related activity, whether it’s a varsity sport, a non-varsity sport, exercising just for fitness reasons, or working a job that requires physical activity. Maintaining the fitness that you’ve built throughout high school once you get to college, however, can be difficult. To stay on track, you’ve got to make a conscious effort to make staying fit a priority. Here are a few tips to help you avoid gaining weight and losing fitness.

First, it’s important to intentionally make exercising a priority. Set aside a specific amount of time every day, at the same time of day, to go for a walk, lift some weights, get on your bike, or play some pick-up basketball. If you can’t do it at the same time every day, plan your week in advance and mark the times that you’ll be physically active. It doesn’t have to be a large amount of time—the ACSM recommends 30 minutes of moderately intense cardiovascular exercise (like running, swimming, cycling, cross-country skiing, or playing a fairly intense sport) five days a week, or 20 minutes of very intense exercise three days a week (you can see the rest of their guidelines here).

Setting goals can also be a great motivator. If you know that you need to lose some weight (if you’re not sure, ask your campus nurse or consult a body mass index chart), choose a date that you’d like to complete your weight loss by. Then set intermediate goals along the way to make sure that you stay on track. Recruit your friends to help keep you focused.

One of the best ways to stay in shape is to try several new activities to keep you active and doing things that interest you. Have you ever played ultimate before? Or racquetball? Boot hockey? Give intramural sports a shot and try some things that you’ve never done before. You’ll burn a lot of calories, make some new social connections, and maybe even find a sport that you love to do.

There are many important concepts to keep in mind when trying to stay in shape—but one of the most important ones is one of the simplest. It is, in short, “Little things add up to make big differences.” Keep this in mind in your day-to-day life and you’ll find that staying in shape might be easier than you expected. Walk to class every day, instead of driving, if you live close enough to campus. If you’re going off-campus to study, walk to a nearby coffee shop. Take the stairs instead of the elevator. If you’re meeting with a classmate to talk about a project, and don’t need a computer or a great deal of paper, go on a walk instead of sitting in the library. It’s things like these that seem insignificant, but make a big difference over time. It’s all about making fitness a part of your life in college.

Unless you’re going to be living with someone you already know (which may or may not be recommendable), you’ll probably have a roommate randomly assigned to you by your college. This is a great opportunity to meet someone new and start making connections into social groups that you aren’t currently a part of. It can be a little weird at first, moving in with someone that you’ve never met before, but this slight awkwardness can be avoided by meeting up with your roommate before school starts to introduce yourselves and get a few things hammered out.

Most colleges will provide you with the email address or phone number of your future roommate so that you can speak before the year starts. Use this contact information to call or email them at least a couple times so that you have some idea of what living with them is going to be like. This is a good time to talk about things like sleep schedule, homework habits, significant others, and various other issues related to your day-to-day life (you can find a guide that offers some good advice on this here).

Another useful thing to do is to take an inventory of what each of you plans on bringing to the dorm. It doesn’t make sense to have two TV’s, two stereos, or multiple video game systems. Make a list of the items that you’ll be bringing, and ask your roommate to do the same. (this site provides good advice on what to and what not to bring to your dorm room). Don’t skip out on this step—it’ll save you a trip or two back home to bring back some things you don’t need two of.

As well as calling and emailing, it’s good to meet up with you roommate once or twice before you move in (if you’re not from different parts of the state or country, that is). Suggest meeting up at a local restaurant or some other place that you’ll be able to talk. This is a good time to just get to know each other. Talk about what you plan on studying, what you like to do, what kind of music you like, and other things like that. You’re going to be seeing (and probably spending a significant amount of time with) your roommate every day, so it’s good to start establishing a friendship early.

Although you won’t really get a complete picture of what your roommate is like until you’ve spent a lot of time with them, it’s good to meet up with them before the semester starts to coordinate and to get to know each other. While it can be slightly awkward at first, it usually ends up being a lot of fun and will help your relationship get off on the right foot.

College politics is a curious thing. It shares many intricacies and peculiarities with the politics of the nation at large, but also has its own unique “flavor.” Whether your plan on it or not, it’s very likely that you’ll become involved in some sort of political action, debate, or movement on your campus (even if you don’t immediately realize it). Think you’ll be able to stay out of the debate on your campus? Think about some of the issues below and see if you feel strongly enough about any of them to attend a rally, sign a petition, go to a student senate or council session, or even debate with another student.

Equality. Whether it’s GLBT acceptance, women’s rights, racial equality, or any other form of equality that you’re striving for, you’re going to be deeply involved in the political climate of your campus. These are hot issues, especially at some private colleges which have traditionally been very conservative. Before the end of your college career (if not your freshman year), you’ll probably see a march, rally, or minor protest based around one of these issues.

The environment. This is another issue that’s becoming more prevalent on campuses around the country. Many colleges are responding to the growing global green movement by making their campuses more environmentally friendly. Some schools are better than others, and many students are pushing for more environmentally efficient campuses.

Abortion. Though this has little to do with college campuses, it seems to be one of the most polarizing political issues for college students. Many pro-life and pro-choice groups try to sway college students through on-campus and near-campus rallies or exhibitions, and this may have something to do with the development of such strong opinions of college students on this topic. This is also an issue that’s likely to come up in philosophy classes like Ethics, so even if you don’t feel inclined to take a stand either way, you’ll probably either take part in or observe a debate about it (which may spark a larger debate outside of class).

Religion. Regardless of whether you’re at a public, secular school, or a private, non-secular school, religion will almost surely come up as a campus issue at some point or another. Every aspect of this issue can and will be brought up—whether or not intelligent design or macroevolution should be taught in the classroom, whether a non-religious professor should be teaching theology classes, if students should be able to hold faith-related events on campus . . . the list goes on forever.

As you can see, what you may first think of as “politics” as related to college may not cover all of the issues that can spark political debates and action. Students are still developing their sociopolitical, moral, and ethical beliefs, and a significant part of this process of development is discussing and debating with other students. So don’t be afraid of taking a stand for what you believe in; there will be many others to stand with you. And even if you don’t feel like it’s possible to make a change, don’t get discouraged—some very big movements have been started on college campuses throughout history. If you feel compelled to take action, then go for it!