Always meet with your professor
Teachers are great. I should clarify: not all teachers are great, but, for the most part, the teachers here at Chadron, in my experience, are great.
Over the past week, I met with four teachers to clear up my confusion about many things. While I may not have come away from every meeting with a clear understanding of the topic in question, I had a clearer understanding than before the meeting. One of my professors, who is also my academic adviser, was even kind enough to check my requirements to ensure that I enrolled in the classes I need to graduate. Every meeting with a teacher I came away with better understanding and perspective on the class. When I understood better what the class-long project was in one of my classes, I didn’t dread it so much and work hard to avoid it.
Having teachers available on campus is a great benefit of having in person classes. As an easily-intimidated freshman, I never talked to teachers unless absolutely necessary, and that fear impacted my first few semesters. Instead of asking a teacher to clarify what they wanted on an assignment, I spent loads of time wrestling with assignments alone. Not to mention going in to speak to a teacher shows that you actually care about the assignment and the class.
Don’t be afraid to ask dumb questions that you should already know the answer to (assuming that you truly do want an answer). I my experience, most teachers like to hear themselves talk (which is why they became teachers I assume) and genuinely enjoy teaching and passing on knowledge to sincere learners. So, set up an appointment, or just drop in on your teachers during office hours, and ask some questions.
If a particular teacher goes above and beyond, Chadron State College does have this Eagle Impact Award thing going on and nominations are open until March 27. I filled one out myself, and it was pretty straightforward. You just dig up the email we all got (search eagle impact award in outlook), follow the link and fill in the blanks talking about who this faculty or staff member is and how they have inspired, supported and empowered you as a student. You can choose whether you would like your response to be anonymous or not. When you are writing your answers, there is a spell checker and you can left click to see spelling suggestions (very helpful if you are spelling challenged like me). You can submit as many times as you want. Personally, I plan to fill out quite a few forms for some of the amazing faculty and staff that have made a difference in my time as a student. I encourage you to do the same.