7 Enlightening TED Talk Videos Every College Student Should Watch

Summer’s almost over and it’s time to get yourself into school-mode. But with the last few reserved for back- to-school shopping and last minute registration issues, you may be too swamped to think of anything else outside of school supplies and dorm room arrangements.

And we aren’t talking about the usual back-to-school preparations. We’re talking about your life as a student. Are you emotionally and mentally prepared? Can you juggle your schedule effectively, go beyond your comfort zone, adjust to different learning styles? How do you plan on staying inspired?

Because there’s no way you can buy the help and advice you’ll need at a sale, we put together a small round up of 7 timeless and highly relevant TED Talks you’ll definitely want to check out.

These will provide you with some enlightening and trustworthy guidance in your personal development as a student.

Explore Different Things And Try Something New 

College is the place to try new clubs and sports, but getting out there might have you avoiding the sign up lines. If you need a little push, look no further than this TED Talk by Google Engineer, Matt Cutts. He shares his experience on trying something new for 30 days including writing a novel, taking a picture each day, and even hiking up Mount Kilimanjaro! What will you try?

Be Prepared For The Future Job Market

As a student, you may be worrying about economic challenges waiting for you when you’re academic career is over. What will the job market have in store for you? Watch economist Andrew McAffee as he explores what future jobs will look like and offers insight on how to prepare for a highly technical job market.

Learn How To Beat Procrastination

Procrastination. It’s inevitable. The good news is that you can overcome it. Vik Nithy, co-founder of 3 companies at age 20, offers a highly motivating TEDxYouth Talk on mentally beating procrastination with a few actionable steps you can easily put into play.

Improve The Way You Communicate With Others

From speaking up in class to delivering a presentation, most of us dread talking out loud and attracting the spotlight. However, sound consultant, Julian Treasure, makes it less scary with his break down on how and by what means we use our voice to talk to each other. Watch and get some pointers on how to feel at ease before you speak.

How Will You Make Important Decisions?

In college, you’ll be faced with choices that will have an impact on your future, and whether you like it or not, the sole responsibility of those decisions will lie on you. So how do you know what the right decisions are? There’s no definite answer, but Dan Gilbert, Harvard psychologist and Happiness Expert, offers an insightful discussion on the reasons why and how we make the choices we do.

Get The 411 Behind Online Learning

Before you join up for an online class, you’ll want to hear what Peter Norvig, director of research at Google Inc., has to say. He shares his experience on approaching and implementing effective online teaching strategies that are aimed at engaging students and enhancing the way they’re being educated. This is a great talk you’ll want to keep in mind when you’re in an online class with a thousand other students.

Stay Passionate About What You Love To Do

Amidst assignments and the daily study grind, it’s easy to lose sight of your passions. Whether you’re at school for sports, music, science, or writing, you’re there because it’s what you want to do with your life.  When you forget that, listen to some words of inspiration from the author of Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert. She discusses her successes and failures, giving viewers advice on how to continue doing what they love to do.

How to Create Your Own Customized Tab In Microsoft Word 2013

No doubt that when you create a Microsoft Word document, you have one or two tools that you always use. But if those tools span a wide range of functionality, they’ll be scattered across the ribbon, forcing you to click and toggle between tabs and bury it back into the Ribbon every time.

To solve this issue, you can customize the Quick Access Toolbar and even create a few shortcuts for your formatting functions. But why not take your productivity even further and create your own tab?

You can easily get your most commonly used functions on one single tab in Microsoft Word 2013. This way every command you need is right at your fingertips without having to go back and forth between different tabs. Here’s how.

1. Right click on any tab and select Customize the Ribbon.

Customizing the Ribbon

2. In the following dialog, click on New Tab.

Creating New Tab

To label it, right click on it and select Rename. Click on OK

3. Next, create a group to organize your commands by functionality (eg. Formatting, Editing, etc.). To do this, click on New Group. You can rename and add icons for each group by right clicking on it and selecting Rename. Do this for each group you want on your tab.

Creating New Group

Now you can start adding commands to them.

4. To add commands to a specific group, ensure that the group is selected and highlighted. Then in the Choose Commands from column, find and select your favourite command. Click on Add. Or you can drag and drop the command directly into the group. Repeat this for every command you want to include.

Adding Commands to Tab

If you’d like to change the order, simply rearrange them by moving them up or down the list.

5.  Click on OK when you’re finished and your customized tab will be added to the main Ribbon.

New Tab in Ribbon

There are a number of ways to get Microsoft Word customized to your liking. Getting your very own tab set up is one of the easiest ways to do it. What other ways do you have MS Word 2013 tailored to your needs?

How to Attach A PDF File To Microsoft Word Documents

Document Attachment

Digital documents are the number one staple behind any company or workflow.  And everyone shares them whether by email, cloud services, or URL. But do you ever wonder if there’s an even easier way to bundle your documents together? Short answer: yes, there is.

Attaching or embedding PDFs in Word documents can be an even quicker alternative than email attachments. It’s also a dead simple way to combine PDF and Word content together.

Think of PDF documents that contain file attachments. You have everything you need in that one single file and there’s no need to go back to the email for the other attachments.  Doing the same with a Word document can be just as convenient. It can be helpful in situations where you need to:

  • Attach legal PDF documents as an appendix
  • Quickly access PDF forms, reports, contract terms, or brochures
  • Provide extra working drafts or updates to colleagues in business  proposals
  • Access or provide PDF resources as reference for papers you’re writing

Embedding a PDF document within MS Word is a popular and sought-after tip. With digital documents becoming more important these days, it’s a handy and helpful method to keep in mind.

To keep highly related PDF and Word files neatly together, follow these steps:

In Microsoft Word, place your cursor where you’d like the PDF to be located. Then,

1. Go to the Insert tab > Object.

Selecting Insert Object

2. In the Object dialog, go to the Create from File tab

Embedding Object Word Document

3. Click on Browse. Search and select the PDF file you wish to embed.

4. Select Display as icon and leave Link to file unchecked. You can choose to change the icon if you wish.

5. Click on OK.

PDF Embedded Word File​

As you can see, the PDF appears right inside your Word document, and can be opened in your PDF viewer of choice. Know of any other methods for combining Word and PDF files together? Let us know!

Why You Should Become An Investintech Reseller

Here at Investintech, we love to give everyone a way in which they can interact with us. Whether  you want to check in on our social networks, convert a quick file, or make a purchase, we have the resources in place for you.

We even offer a variety of partnership options for businesses.  If you haven’t explored them as a business owner yet, you should. One option you’ll want to check out is our reseller program.

We created the program as a way to connect and to maintain a close professional relationship with businesses on a different level. Members of our program are made up of professional resellers and  companies who redistribute licenses of our products, like Able2Extract, to their customers.

So if your company is looking for new business opportunities to expand, here’s a quick look at how becoming a reseller can help you build a global presence, improve revenue streams, and benefit from great program incentives.

Enjoy The Advantages Of Becoming A Reseller

Reseller Advantages
Photo Credit: stevendepolo via photopin cc

Deciding to become a reseller involves a lot of planning and consideration. On top of finding the right market, products, and program options, you also need to consider the benefits. What’s in it for you? How simple is the process?  What does your company gain?

At every turn, our program aims to make it worthwhile for all members.   To that end, we offer some great advantages. Here are just a few:

  • Full customer and technical support is available
  • Website listing (PR 6) along with a link back to your site
  • Quality conversion software for distribution
  • Full access to product resources
  • Online product discounts for resellers
  • On-time order fulfillment
  • Greater online visibility
  • Simple registration process

Offer Relevant Tools To Existing Customers

Software Tools For Customers
Photo Credit: SEOPlanter via photopin cc

If you’re a business that’s already providing services or software, our reseller program is an easy way to complement and expand on your existing offerings.   PDF converters, like Able2Extract, are already tools that many individuals use on a daily basis, and they can fit into any niche and workflow that involves working with PDF data. Whether it’s for an accountant who needs  financial PDF data or a college student who needs PDF text for research, PDF content will always need to be converted for reuse or editing.

Create A Unique Business Identity

Being a reseller means that you can assist customers in a new way without sacrificing your existing goals or corporate identity. In fact, with our program you get to strengthen your brand and credibility on a global scale by becoming a valuable resource to customers all over the world.

Global Reseller IdentityPhoto Credit: ToddMorris via photopin cc

For instance, when users would rather deal with a local vendor from your region due to purchasing or language reasons, they can be quickly referred over to you for assistance. In this way, they can gain access to new products from a vendor they trust no matter where they’re located.

Getting Started

Interested in joining the program? All it takes is an email to our sales team to start the process.  We’ll send out the registration form, and once the application is reviewed, your company will be notified within one business day if you’ve been approved.

A number of authoritative software distributors are currently part of our program, and we’re always looking to welcome new members.  Email us at sales@investintech.com for more information.

How To Use Google Docs And Sheets Add-ons For Writing Papers

If you’re a student, you’re probably always on the lookout for ways to cut costs wherever possible. And a free online word processor like Google Docs, is a popular alternative. It’s where you go when you need to share, edit and store documents.

But do you always have what you need when working with Google Docs?  Now that Google Drive offers Google Docs and Sheets add-ons, you do. They offer more functionality and flexibility when creating complex documents online.  If you haven’t tried these out yet, you should.

The life of a student is made up of a lot of information, and you need to be able to break down, organize, write, and carefully cite your arguments.  With Google Docs and Sheets add-ons, you can now accomplish almost everything needed to write a paper, from start to finish.

Here’s a quick guide on what we thought were the handiest add-ons for the job.

Plan Out Your Argument With Gliffy Diagrams

One of the first steps for creating any paper is the outline. For an essay of any notable length, you need to map out your arguments clearly and effectively.  In Google Docs, you can use the Gliffy diagrams add-on where you can easily create a flow chart or mind map on your topic.

Gliffy Diagram Creation ToolImage Credit: Gliffy.com

The add-on takes you to the Gliffy site where you can start creating a simple map out of your ideas and then access or insert it right into Google Docs to keep yourself on track. With a free account, you can create up to 5 diagrams.

Use Texthelp Study Skills To Sift Through Your Notes

When it comes time to sift through class notes and first drafts, it can be frustrating to have to go through them all one by one and extract what you need. But by using the Texthelp Study Skills highlighting tools add-on, you can speed up the sorting process significantly.

Texthelp Highlighting Tools

These highlighting tools allow you to highlight important points and then collect that highlighted text into a new document. This is handy as you can then start filling out your paper around the text. No need to copy and paste or toggle back and forth. An extremely helpful add-on for integrating your research notes with the actual writing of your paper.

Get EasyBib To Create Your Bibliography

As you write and incorporate your research and quotations, use EasyBib to create a bibliography. This eliminates the tedious task of manually documenting sources, especially when they can come in every possible type of format.

You can cite sources into MLA, APA, or Chicago style directly in the side bar. Easybib makes it as easy as pasting in the title, ISBN, or URL of your source.At the end, clicking on the Generate Bibliography button will add  it neatly to the end of your paper. This way you can focus on the writing instead of the details of your citations.

Have ProWriting Aid Double Check The Text

When you’re ready to edit and proof read your finished draft, make sure you catch all errors by using the ProWriting Aid add-on.

ProWritingAid Text Checker

It not only performs instant checks for grammar, but also checks consistency, plagiarism and overused words. ProWriting Aid will provide you with a full report in the side bar. And from there, you can edit and rewrite your text as needed.

Consult Thesaurus To Give Your Writing A Boost

As an added measure, the Thesaurus add-on is helpful when adding the finishing touches to your writing. Just select a word in your document and activate the add-on. A side-bar will pop up with suggestions right within Google Docs, which is more convenient than having to Google around for another word in another window.

By no means do you have to pigeon-hole yourselves to these add-ons. All the offered add-ons are general enough to help with any writing need you may have.  So check them out and let us know which ones help you the most.