After the car is unpacked, dorm room organization commences.

With surgical precision you align folders, sort pencils and fold clothes. Upon your parents’ departure, it is nearly impossible to differentiate your newly minted college dorm room from those in catalogs.

Now it’s time to get your digital ducks in order. There are a few high-tech ideas that will improve your efficiency and leave you with more time to, well, not do schoolwork.

Timing: Half the battle of college is making sure you are organized. Knowing which homework assignments are due when could be the difference between catching a Syracuse University basketball game and pecking away at your keyboard all night. When it comes to inputting assignments, test dates and presentation times, iStudiesPro is an amazing resource.

iStudiesPro also uses the cloud, so when you add a new assignment on your iPhone, it will automatically sync when you open either your laptop or tablet. When the app sends notification reminders — a great feature — you will likely be near one of your devices.

This app is far better than standard digital calendar applications because it caters specifically to inputting classes and managing assignments. While a traditional calendar application works well for scheduling events, these notifications are not only tricky to customize, but also may not display exactly what is due for a given class. Price: $0.99

News: News aggregators are a great way pick and choose the news you enjoy reading about. Pulse is a website and smartphone application that allows you to choose categories and Internet sources that pertain to your interests. If you enjoy reading about entertainment news and politics, Pulse will help you compile a healthy collection of articles related to those subjects.

Once you make an account, your whole user experience will constantly sync between your devices. Competing news aggregators include Google Reader, Flipboard and Digg, which are all dwarfed by the fluid, touch-ready interface. Compatibility is also a strong suit because the interface is nearly identical for iOS, Android and Web.  Price: $0.99

Tools: The vast majority of college students today use Google as their primary search engine, but few people take full advantage of the useful array of tools that come free with a Gmail account. Google Docs is arguably the most comprehensive, free suite of software you will find on the Web.

Even though Microsoft Office has launched some cloud integration, it still lags in usability when compared to Google Docs. The newly revamped interface boasts hundreds of creative fonts and easy rich formatting capabilities like image integration.

Google has software for documents, presentations, spreadsheets, forms and drawings. Google Drive is another tool that affords you five free gigabytes that can be synced automatically between your various devices. Class projects can often be a nightmare when it comes to collaboration, and Google Docs comes to the rescue by allowing live, multi-person editing. Price: Free

Fun: If you are looking for a cool new way to express yourself via the numerous social networks that you are already a part of, check out this new startup called Vizify. When it comes to a fluid interface, no website I have seen does a more comprehensive job at mixing personal information and visual flare than Vizify.

The Vizify founders were on a mission to harness your disjointed information on various social ecosystems and fuse it into an all-in-one Web biography. Whether you are procrastinating or just browsing between classes, this graphic design gem creatively showcases pictures, Twitter feeds, quotes, check-ins and even your resume. Check it out, it’s also free.

Jared Rosen is a sophomore advertising and marketing management major. His column appears weekly. He can be contacted at jmrose03@syr.edu or followed on Twitter at @jaredmarc14.

Published on August 28, 2012 at 12:30 am

Contact Jared: jmrose03@syr.edu