It’s hard to make a conscious effort to learn when you have so many responsibilities in your daily life. Many people think after they’re finished with school — whether it be high school, university, or a trade — that they won’t have to engage in learning. However, this couldn’t be further than the truth.

Learning is a form of improving yourself. Whether you’re studying new topics or learning how to improve the relationships around you, learning is a vital tool for self-empowerment and progression. Here are some of the best ways to become a lifelong learner.

Keep a notebook handy

Utilizing notebooks is the best way to record important or interesting information. When your friend recommends an interesting Ted Talk, you’ll be likely to forget it unless you write it down. Notebooks are also great ways to organize your learning, keep track of the progress you make, and offer helpful reminders for when you should make your new skill a habit.

When you become a lifelong learner, you don’t have to become an expert in everything; however, simply performing research on topics you find interesting is a great way to start your learning experience. Dig up your old laboratory notebooks or brush off your student lab notebook.

Engage with others who want to learn

Like most things in life, learning is more fun when you get to share it with someone else. Learning is one of the most exciting parts of being alive and sharing information with others will keep your learning experience more interesting. Having discussions, joining a book club, or even becoming a trivia master with scientific notebook in hand is a great way to connect with others who care about self-improvement and lifelong learning.

Read, read, read

Read everything you can get your hands on. When you become an avid reader, you’re able to mull over information, backtrack on old points and perspectives, and craft your own ideologies based on the thoughts of others. Whether you’re into self-help books or career advice books, reading will open the door to a slew of new perspectives and put you on the right path toward introspection. They will also offer tips and tricks for applying these skills in daily life.

And take notes

Reading something is great, but you’re likely not going to remember every page of a 300-page book. This is where taking notes comes in.

By relying on a tool like a bound lab notebook, you’re able to review the important points and skills later in words you understand (after all, you wrote them). Your research notebook is a tool to open the door to becoming a lifelong learner. This is especially essential for those in the medical field where new technological innovations happen practically on the daily. The medical field is expected to grow by nearly 23% by 2024, making learning an ever-important skill for the doctor or pharmacist who wants to stay ahead of the game.

In the end, we’re all students. Even though your days of traditional schooling may be over, learning is a vital skill to improve your quality of life. Whether you learn new ways to improve your job performance, learn new ways to communicate with your partner, or simply want to learn to learn, becoming a lifelong learner is the best way to keep your ambitions high and your life interesting.

As of 2016, there were roughly 9,550 biochemistry degrees awarded to graduating college students. These students spend countless hours inside laboratories across the country and have to be extremely careful every step of the way. There are all kinds of mistakes that can lead to some disastrous consequences inside a laboratory.

Here are some common laboratory mistakes that you should avoid at all costs:

• • Not going in with a detailed plan — If you’re not bringing your laboratory notebooks with you prior to an experiment, you’re going to potentially have some serious issues on your hand. You need to plan out every aspect of your experiment and keep everything organized in your notebook. Being able to reference back to your plans and findings is key for any scientific project.

• • Storing regents incorrectly — Another common scientific mistake involves not properly storing chemical reagents. For example, if you’re refrigerating chemicals that should be frozen, your entire experiment will be in jeopardy.

• • Taking short cuts — Avoid taking short cuts at all costs. If an experiment requires an incubation period of 30 minutes, patiently wait the required 30 minutes and don’t cut anything short. Make sure you know exactly what your time investment will be before beginning an experiment.

Additionally, here are some things that you should never do when working in a lab:

• • Never bring any food or drinks into the lab.

• • Never taste or smell any lab samples or chemicals for any reason at all.

• • Never handle chemicals alone or unsupervised.

• • Never forget to wash your hands after handling with chemicals or hazardous materials

• • Never wait too long before cleaning up any spills.

• • Never forget to wear the appropriate gloves, safety glasses, or goggles.

• • Never wear loose or drafty clothing that could get caught in any equipment or come in contact with various chemicals.

• • Never leave experiments running unattended.

• • Never work when you are exhausted or emotionally upset.

If you want to learn more about how to effectively work inside a laboratory, as well as find plenty of quality research notebooks, give Scientific Notebook Company a call today.

The United States holds an estimated 45% of the global pharmaceutical market. Working as a pharmacist can be one of the most rewarding and lucrative jobs in the country, and this position certainly isn’t going away. In fact, job growth for pharmacists is actually projected to increase by 3% by 2024.

If you’re currently in college and are working toward your goal of breaking into the pharmaceutical industry (or a related industry within the scientific community), you need to make sure you’re taking your education seriously. Even making a few minor miscues during this crucial period of your life can ruin your chances of landing a great scientific job.

Here are some common mistakes that students make within the scientific community:

• Not keeping track of research –Research is extremely important in college, but it’s absolutely imperative when it comes to any scientific field. From day one of school until the end of your (hopefully) long-lasting scientific career, you’re going to need to keep track of all your notes, findings, and data points. Scientific notebooks are essential for every point throughout your educational and professional career.
• Spending too much time studying — Studying, obviously, is a key factor of success when it comes to schooling. But far too many scientific students only focus on memorizing terms and formulas, rather than actually implementing what they learn. You need to study, yes, but it’s just important to get into the lab and gain some practical experience.
• Ignoring safety procedures — Whether you’re mixing chemicals, handling pharmaceuticals, or anything in between, you need to constantly be thinking about safety. Start focusing on safety aspects early on in your studies so it comes as second nature once you get out into the field. A single safety mistake can have catastrophic results when it comes to the medical, pharmaceutical, and scientific sector.

Work hard in the lab, focus on safety, take and review plenty of notes, and always focus on safety to succeed in the scientific field. If you want to find your own high-quality scientific notebook or purchase great laboratory notebooks, give Scientific Notebook Company a call today.

It typically takes eight years of college education to earn a Doctor of Pharmacy degree (Pharm.D.) and become a pharmacist. Whether you’re planning on going through all that schooling to work in the pharmaceutical industry or just want to improve the “Special Skills” section of your resume, you’re going to need to know how to successfully research — and research a lot.

Without knowing how to properly research, you’ll not only struggle through the next few years as a student, but you’ll find it difficult to gather essential information throughout all your years working in your professional field. Here are some excellent tips to become a master researcher:

• • Get high quality research notebooks — Students who attempt to study difficult topics and gather research will find it much more taxing without a great notebook. It sounds obvious, but not having a place to keep track of all your thoughts and your findings will result in mass confusion when you’re trying to organize all your research. Cleanroom notebooks are great for gathering and keeping track of important data.

• • Research in groups — Though you can certainly accomplish a lot on your own, the best research projects involve multiple minds. When you bring in a few colleagues for a massive research project, not only will it help lessen the load for you, but it will also result in you all discovering a lot more important information.

• • Review your notes frequently — Some large-scale research projects can last years, so it can be easy to lose track of all that valuable data you accumulated early on. Whenever you get some free time during your project, go back into your notes and review all the data you originally collected. Periodically, spend some time organizing your notes and data so it’s always easy to find when needed.

If you’re ready to improve your student abilities and become the best researcher you can be, it’s time to grab some Cleanroom notebooks and other laboratory notebooks and get to work! If you want to find high quality Cleanroom notebooks, give Scientific Notebook Company a call today.

Whether you’re working in a lab with groups of students or are doing scientific research professionally, laboratory projects need to be handled with the utmost care. Many of these tasks involve research that could potentially lead to revolutionary scientific breakthroughs, possibly even saving lives down the road.

Scientific and laboratory studies involve taking a look at how medications affect the human body, how viruses can be prevented, geological findings, and everything in-between.

Whatever stage you’re at in your career, if you’re performing research or working in a laboratory, you need to take it seriously. Here are some tips that should help you succeed in the lab throughout your scientific career:

• • Get plenty of laboratory notebooks — Since you’ll need to annotate every single move you make throughout your research project, you need high quality laboratory notebooks to do so. You’ll sometimes need to compare your day one notes with a new discovery you make years down the road, so be sure to have plenty of research notebooks and never throw any of your valuable information out.

• • You have to remain patient — Laboratory and scientific work isn’t exactly the fastest method of study, and it shouldn’t be. If you are solving problems in a matter of days, you’re probably not solving anything. For instance, it takes anywhere from 10 to 15 years to develop a new vaccine or medication — if you’re lucky. You need to constantly remind yourself to remain patient and continue to put in the necessary work in order to one day maybe reach a breakthrough discovery.

• • Know how to fail — In addition to being patient, having the ability to accept failure and move on to the next research opportunity is just as important within the scientific community. You’re going to fail at some point, there is no doubt about it. But you can’t let that failure deter you from gathering up all your notes, getting back into the lab, and starting over. No successful scientist or lab worker has a success rate even close to 100%. You’ll fail, you’ll fail some more, but keep at it, because eventually you will succeed.

If you want to learn more about succeeding in the scientific community and find quality research notebooks and laboratory notebooks, give Scientific Notebook Company a call right away.