If you are interested in playing games (Minecraft, in your case), the Pro is the best for that. It is a lot faster because it has better processors, although the Air does have a slightly better graphics card, but not by far (The Air has an Intel HD Graphics 5000, whereas the Pro has 4000). For playing games like Minecraft, a Windows laptop in the same price range is better, maybe consider that. Don't expect either laptops to be brilliant with playing the games though. The Air will run it, however you may need to reduce the render distance to Small, or turn the graphics to Fast.
The Pro has a lower screen resolution of 1280 x 800 compared to the Air with a resolution of 1440 x 900. If you are not aware, the screen resolution is how many pixels (the small squares of light that make up your screen) are on the display. This isn't a major thing, however, and isn't noticeable to most people. Both laptops can support 720p HD resolution for watching your movies, and neither can support 1080p.
The battery life is lower on the Pro. The Air has a battery life of 12 hours, whereas the Pro has a battery life of 7 hours. 7 hours is still a long time, but it would all depend on how you would use your laptop and how often you would charge it.
For editing and creating movies, both laptops come with iMovie and both laptops are more than capable of running it, but the Pro would render videos faster. For more intensive video editing software (like Final Cut Pro), the Pro would be better at handling that.
I'm not sure how the electricity bills work at your University, assuming that you are staying in a student house, but keeping this in mind, the Pro has a larger power consumption when charging (60 watts) than the Air, which only uses 45 watts. This isn't a major difference, but it's something to keep in mind. For comparison, a microwave is usually around 800 watts, so the amounts are definitely not large.
For education and note taking, both laptops come with Pages, Numbers and Keynote, which are useful pieces of software.
If you want more information about comparing the models, the Apple website has a brilliant comparison: https://www.apple.com/...books.html
