I Really Need some Collge Inspiration Right Now

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WinnieThePujols

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I'm in my third semester of college. I didn't really have a good first year (2.5 cumulative), and I can't say this semester is going very well either.

Started at 17 credits. Immediately decidedly I'd go to 14, because I needed to get my grades up so I wanted to stay focused...

Well, I emailed my English professor a draft last week and he basically said, "You're not coming to class. You can't pass without regular attendence. You're missing out on feedback...blah blah blah... I suggest you drop. You've missed homework and quizzes...etc"

Down to 11 credits. Not even considered a full-time student.

I just got done BOMBING an Assembly Language programming class test. My computer teacher is like Korean and seriously has the English capabilities of like a pre-schooler. If you ask him a question he'll go off on a tangent because he can't understand it. The entire test was foreign to me, and I think I got like a 10%.

I'm doing well in Calculus and Speech, but this computer class really, really hurts. I mean, the test -- given how shitty I probably did -- is just a crushing blow.

What if I got some ungodly bad percent, like 15% or something? I can't drop it... I can't drop to 7 ****ing credits, but at the same time, I can't get an F or a D in the class -- I'd have to retake it.

What the hell do I do? I'm so apathetic about college. This just sucks. I usually do very well on test / papers / etc, so I thought college catered to me... but God this has been a rude awakening.

Please someone give me some advice.

Did anyone else have really bad starts to college and then finish strong or anything?

This is just depressing.
 
"Collge" Priceless. :D

EDIT: For inspiration - I had less than a 2.0 my freshman year of college and I have an awesome job now and I'd consider myself pretty susccessful.
 
I would say stick it out for at least another semester, but if you are unhappy or you don't really have a clear goal or you expect to do about the same next semester, you might consider taking some time off.

A friend of mine had similar struggles and stuck around about two years too long before he decided to quit. He kept changing his major and quit early one semester (about $9,000 down the toilet ...). He started in Fall 2001, and decided he had had enough and quit before the spring semester of 2006. For all of that time and money and effort, he only has something like 80 credits. He is a smart guy, too, but college just didn't agree with him. He kept going because of pressure from his parents and the misconception that you HAVE to have a college education to get a good job. Before college, he had a tech support job and got paid about $15 an hour. After quitting school, he has the exact same tech support job for $15 an hour. And he is $30,000 in debt with nothing to show for it.
 
If the assembly teacher is that bad go to his / her department chair and explain the situation in a rational tone. Maybe he shouldn't be teaching. If the professor is an adjunct or just visiting he / she may not be asked to come back next term.
 
this is going to come off horribly, but I mean it in the best way possible--

sounds like you need a kick in the ass more than inspiration.

"You're not coming to class. You can't pass without regular attendence. You're missing out on feedback...blah blah blah... I suggest you drop. You've missed homework and quizzes...etc"


this says you just aren't putting in any effort. did you even go the first day of class? People say stupid things like "you don't have to go to class or do homework in college," but they don't really mean it. You just gotta be more disciplined and sacrifice your free time to study. doing that much should land you Bs and Cs, maybe some As if you have easy classes.

about the korean instructor-- shit happens. as bad as it is, other people have taken the class before you, other people are in the class now, and I'm sure some of them are going out of their way to understand what he's talking about. Sometimes you get a shitty prof who doesn't teach the material so well, but it's no excuse to get a 10% on a test. Just learn the material from the book or other things, maybe find someone who can help you learn the stuff, and try harder at understanding him. You should file a complaint if he's bad, but as it is, you're stuck with him right now.

well, that's all i got. sorry if you hate me know ;)
 
I am in my frggin first year and they have this test for people who did not take the SAT. So I took this test which was on computer and I had a lmited amount of time for the writting part which hurts my hand so then Splat they stick me in these Remidial classes

I am barely in the Remedial classes having to hear from these dickless professors.

You failed get it over with.

Why bother even coming.

If you continue this way you might as well drop out.

I have no book voucher and my parents do not give me money. In fact they never give me anything unless I go threw a big negatiation that eventualy leads back to my birth. I have no public work exprience thanks to Summer school and the removal of behavior.

Even if I buy the books I can't return them since the books is worth 0.00 dollars in the system. Then the colege makes us the campus( like we have one) email.

I don't know if I should drop this and that class to aviod a bad grade but then again I can't even afford the crappy remedial books or want to buy them.

Who in there rights mind will pay money for a books filled with sentences with many mistakes, Elementary math ( Fifth grade math), or even Microsoft 2003 which is filled with a bunch of extra features 97 don't have.

My major classes is no problems since I learn something new even if the whole department switched over to digital this and that. I mean WTF a whole class on using a program when that same program is being replaced by other programs now.

Then some of these Major Professors dont even know what PDF, RAW, or JPG stands for or the main uses of the file type.

If I did not have the crapppy Non-credit classes I would be more then happy right now but after hearing how just last year they replace everything and a whole area of the College is closed off dew to radiation I could give damn what dickless instructor says.

I have it worst then you and I am barely into my first semister.
 
I'm sure everyone gets their fair share of foreign professors that we cannot understand. If you makes you feel any better, I had to withdraw from college for a quarter and I had to pay $2000 out of my own pocket. Just so, I would not get any bad grades. During my first year, I clowned around so much that I feel asleep on one of my midterms. You should see the faces of some of my classmates. My head was bobbing up and down on the desk as I was struggling to stay awake.

First of all, don't complain. Second, get some study partners from your classes. Studying in a group always help especially if you can spot all the smart ones. Lastly, college is easy if you put in the effort towards studying.
 
Bear down, do what you have to do, and never turn-in anything late or not at all. This is make or break time in your life, you have to put in effort to get something out of college. Don't take more credits than you can handle, just take 12 or 13 per semester; it's pointless to take over the amount you can handle.
 
[quote name='RegalSin2020']Who in there rights mind will pay money for a books filled with sentences with many mistakes[/quote]Especially when you can come on here and do it for free.
 
Assembly never was a fun or easy subject, but with discipline it can easily be understood and put to use.

If you are taking CS classes, get ready for instructors that can't speak English. It must be a nationwide thing really. I have a Masters and Bachelors in Computer Science and out of the 6 years I went to school, I probably had a teacher who could speak "proper" english 10% of the time. Eventually after a few weeks you'll learn what the guy is saying. You can always ask other students as well.

I had a software engineering prof that couldn't speak English. He kept saying, "it's wery important to use proper technicals". Everyone was like...what the fuck are technicals. What he was really trying to say was "techniques".

Long story short. Go to class and study.
 
[quote name='mtxbass1']
Long story short. Go to class and study.[/QUOTE]

That's the best advice anyone could give a college student. If you don't show up to class and you don't study and do the work, odds are you're going to struggle.
 
Well, to put the other classes into perspective:

Calculus I got a "D" second semester of school. This time around I'm putting in effort, doing the homework, etc... and I'm off to a good start, with a 93 / 100 on my first test. Been getting good grades on the homework, as well (which is good, the guy last semester had quizzes and no homework).

My first speech I had like a 14/15 on, and I'm doing well in that class.

I guess computers have also come so naturally to me that I didn't expect a struggle like this. For instance, in Intro to Java I went the first day, the midterm and the final and passed with an "A," because the concepts were really easy to understand for me. I seem to be able to program well, but the terminology and things like taking written tests on it seems to give me trouble.

I just feel overwhelmed right now. Even though I bombed this test, I think that if I keep up in the labs (which count for 25% of the grade) and do well on the other tests I can probably pass with a C overall. I don't really think I got a 10%; it really boils down to how much partial credit he's going to give.

I don't know, I made this topic right after the test and was freaking out.

The thing that surprised me so much about that email from the English professor is that, my attendence in my Composition class (60%?) last year was pretty much exactly the same, and I finished with a high B for the year. I didn't think teachers cared if you came to class, much less in an English class... A class like Calc I always go to though, or the computer class (even though it's not worthwhile since I can't understand him).
 
You're in college. You've already done so much better than most people do. You've gotten an opportunity that some unfortunately don't get even when they deserve it.

Just remember that, and do your best. That's all you can do.
 
College is a bitch. The classes are generally useless and headed up by the most out of touch and conceited people the school could hire. It's just something you have to deal with.

Part of the problem is that you're starting to discover your weaknesses, and that's never a good feeling. I'm in my third year right now, and things are just getting harder and harder. I'm doing well in my upper level Econ classes, but I'm taking a 110 Philo class for a religion credit that's kicking my ass. I just CAN'T grasp logic proofs. It's not that I'm an idiot, or I'm partying too hard, or blowing shit off; it's just something I'm not immediately good at. Despite that, I'm not going to just admit defeat and take it up the ass. I'm going to hit these proofs hard this weekend in preperation for my exam, and I've told myself that if I can't completely grasp it, I will at least come away with a better understanding of something I'm weak at.

My adivce is to not give up. If you give in to your weaknesses, you're just setting yourself up to fail for the rest of your life. Trying and failing may bruise your self esteem, but blowing shit off just because you think it's"too hard" is only setting yourself up for crippling defeats later in life.
 
I think college is all about your instructors. Bad ones can make a class that much harder and you lose your motivation. Good ones can help you sail through. It sounds like you got one bad one and its slowly effecting your attitude.

I would suggest continuing with your classes, and if you get a bad grade retake it. It will be that much easier the next time you take it and you will be able to handle a higher credit load. Just make sure you get feedback on your professors for the next time and change them accordingly. Ask your freinds or counselors about teacher reps. You will get some pretty interesting observations and most of the time can stear clear of the bad ones just by word of mouth.

In order to take full advantage of the teacher choice you will have to register as soon as its available cause the good prof's classes always fill up first.

If that isn't motivation enough, try this:

www.mcdonalds.com

Everyone has college hickups, it's up to you to keep going though! Don't let a few bad teachers or classes get to you. I it gets worse, then take more electives that you enjoy and push your hated class to next semester.
 
[quote name='javeryh']"Collge" Priceless. :D

EDIT: For inspiration - I had less than a 2.0 my freshman year of college and I have an awesome job now and I'd consider myself pretty susccessful.[/QUOTE]

OK first off, you are wasting our time with poo stories. I think I'm not the only one that would LOVE to read your life story and would find it loads more interesting.

You have an adventure just waiting to be told and I for one would like to hear "The Adventures of Javeryh and How I Became So Amazing" then "I dropped my psp in the toilet after I pooed and kept playing"
I think your story would be, at the very least, incredibly entertaining. Just the statement" I had a 2.0 freshman year and now make like 1 million dollars a year after taxes" is intriguing in itself.

(Although poo stories are fun to read as well, I just dont think you are letting us in on the most interesting part)
 
I was in just about the same position as you are a few years ago. I had a low GPA and very few credits for the 3 semesters I had been in school but managed to graduate with honors and get into grad school. What you need to do is start going to every class every day, don't let yourself get into the habit of skipping classes it can be hard to break. Take good notes and don't let bad professors get you. I had a number of sketchy profs that made class difficult in different ways. Three of them were from India and had very thick and hard to understand accents. What I would do is just go to class and bring the textbook and use that to follow along and figure out where he was going with the lecture. Once I realized what he was getting at for the day I would tune him out and just read the section from the textbook during class then catch up with some of my classmates later and see if they had anything in thier notes that I may have missed.
 
[quote name='javeryh']"Collge" Priceless. :D

EDIT: For inspiration - I had less than a 2.0 my freshman year of college and I have an awesome job now and I'd consider myself pretty susccessful.[/QUOTE]

Man, they'll take just about anyone in law school nowadays, won't they? ;)

As for the OP, GO TO ALL CLASSES AND STUDY THE MATERIAL. That's all you have to do most of the time. It seems like you're not even doing that. Don't make excuses for not going to class, just go. Your grades will be higher and you'll be much less stressed. I generally read the book chapters that are covered in the lecture after class unless a teacher tells us we have to read it beforehand. I suggest doing this as well. DO NOT WAIT UNTIL THE NIGHT BEFORE A TEST TO OPEN THE BOOK. If there are problems and homework assigned, do them, even if they're not graded. It's not very hard to do well in college as long as you use common sense. I've just done what I've said in this paragraph, and I've got a 3.82 GPA and it looks like it will increase after this quarter if things continue as well as they are-- just by doing the things I mentioned. There's no magic tricks to doing well in college. It's just discipline.
 
[quote name='RegalSin2020']I am in my frggin first year and they have this test for people who did not take the SAT. So I took this test which was on computer and I had a lmited amount of time for the writting part which hurts my hand so then Splat they stick me in these Remidial classes

I am barely in the Remedial classes having to hear from these dickless professors.

You failed get it over with.

Why bother even coming.

If you continue this way you might as well drop out.

I have no book voucher and my parents do not give me money. In fact they never give me anything unless I go threw a big negatiation that eventualy leads back to my birth. I have no public work exprience thanks to Summer school and the removal of behavior.

Even if I buy the books I can't return them since the books is worth 0.00 dollars in the system. Then the colege makes us the campus( like we have one) email.

I don't know if I should drop this and that class to aviod a bad grade but then again I can't even afford the crappy remedial books or want to buy them.

Who in there rights mind will pay money for a books filled with sentences with many mistakes, Elementary math ( Fifth grade math), or even Microsoft 2003 which is filled with a bunch of extra features 97 don't have.

My major classes is no problems since I learn something new even if the whole department switched over to digital this and that. I mean WTF a whole class on using a program when that same program is being replaced by other programs now.

Then some of these Major Professors dont even know what PDF, RAW, or JPG stands for or the main uses of the file type.

If I did not have the crapppy Non-credit classes I would be more then happy right now but after hearing how just last year they replace everything and a whole area of the College is closed off dew to radiation I could give damn what dickless instructor says.

I have it worst then you and I am barely into my first semister.[/QUOTE]


QFT.


wait...what?
 
I'm still in high school, but I'm taking six AP classes and some great tips I've picked up include:

-Don't procrastinate, it WILL bite you in the ass
-Keep a detailed to-do list
-Try to start a HW/study schedule and allow time for short BREAKS
-BRING A TAPE RECORDER
-Take amazing notes and look over them for about 20 minutes a day
-Sit up front and try to stay as alert as possible
-If you know an answer to a question that the instructor asks, try to answer
it first. It gives a good impression
-If you don't understand something, find some people to study with. Group
work is possibly the most beneficial tool in college courses.
-Improve your writing skills. I'm taking a latin class and a creative writing
class, and it's amazing how much good writing will help you in EVERY class.
-For the Korean professor, listen very closely and try to learn his vocabulary.
-A few people have mentioned this, but show up to class everyday.
-DON"T BE AFRAID TO ASK QUESTIONS

Hope this helps and good luck with the rest of your college career.

EDIT: Also, get on the good side of ALL of your instructors. Do whatever it takes. Laugh at terrible jokes, discuss things with them that they are interested in, overachieve on homework or projects, carry around some books about something very specific in the course they teach. (When we were learning about Rome, I brought books like the Mediations or some Roman philosophy. The teacher loved it and she now knows my name and speaks to me frequently which can be difficult to acheive in a class of 90 people)

EDIT 2: Try to get as much sleep as you can and keep yourself healthy. It really keeps your attitude positive. Another suggestion would be find a constructive hobby to take your mind of things. (Maybe a club or weekend sport?)
 
[quote name='javeryh']"Collge" Priceless. :D

EDIT: For inspiration - I had less than a 2.0 my freshman year of college and I have an awesome job now and I'd consider myself pretty susccessful.[/quote]

Hahaha... "susccessful" ... I'm such a tool.
 
Hmm, sounds suspiciously like my first year of college. However, I am currently working on my second masters degree. Here's what I suggest:

1.) Don't take more than 12 hours (full time status) until you are confident you can do so. Taking an extra year for ease is better than flunking out early.

2.) I had a comp sci teacher (VS Pascal back then) who didn't speak English well and the tests seemed very hard to me as well. I did pass, but no one in my class (~40 students) got an A. Since he was a graduate student teacher, I complained to his supervising professor. He didn't care and said I earned the grade. However, I learned that your best friend is someone else in the class or in the program who is more of a computer nerd than you. They probably pass because they already know it, not because of the teaching.

3.) What finally saved me is changing majors to something I was more interested in. I still do computer work on the side, but I work in mental health because it suits my personality and interest better. I discovered my interest by realizing my volunteering was what I was looking forward to.
 
ratemyprofessors.com

I'm doing pretty well in college, and having the right professors is a big help. The fact is, there are terrible professors in college, but you just have to stay away from them. Having good professors makes things a lot more tolerable.
 
I do have some experience in this, having taken a long (mostly my fault) road through college and eventually graduating and getting a good job.

I'll start with my history, because it does apply. I started college in 1993. I went to Georgia Tech for engineering because I was basically pushed into it by my parents. I had no interest in engineering but I really didn't know what I wanted to do so I went with it. School had always come easy as hell to me and I figured I could continue to get As in just about everything with little effort. I was a total lazy bum. For my 1 and a 1/3 years at GT I rarely went to class and it showed. My GPA was around 2.0 I believe before I came back home. I would literally go weeks between attending ANY classes. Often I'd use the syllabus as a concrete schedule and just show for tests. Ultimately I got the boot, came back to NJ and went to community college while working for the post office. I worked hard for a few semesters, getting all As then as I approached an associates in management I started to get lazy again and failed one class, did mediocre in a few others and one semester had to beg ALL of my profs not to fail me because I cut the first SIX WEEKS! I managed to pass with a pretty good GPA. I continued working for the post office, now with an actual career type job and took a break from school until the post office started to grind on me. I went back to school at night to get a bachelor's in economics. I actually made an effort to show up more often than not this time, and applied what I had learned over the years (I found it difficult to completely turn off lazy bum mode starting work at 2:30 am and taking classes at 7pm at night 4 nights a week) to know when and when not to cut and did well, and got my degree. I now have a well paying and stable job working for the Department of Defense that I think I am actually going to like. I graduated in 2005. So I spent a total of 12 years in college to get a bachelors and an associates, something that should take 6 years tops.

Now, you are not doing well. You cannot afford to screw around. If they kick you out your only real option is to go to a community college until you get your grades back up. So...first off, GO TO FREAKIN CLASS! Some classes you can cut a lot. But you need experience in the type of prof that cares if you do and the type that doesn't. You don't have enough to guess and you could not afford to try it even if you did. You don't always guess right. If you show up every day and show you are making an effort it DOES help. Also just because you did bad on a test doesn't mean you failed, or failed miserably. Even professors that don't have official curves, do at times. I passed a Chemistry class where I never got a grade above 30 and yes that is 30 out of 100. Actually I believe my highest was a 24 if I remember right. But everyone else did bad too. So I creeped into the passing group. If you absolutely insist on cutting (and you are a fool at this point if you do) do not cut any small classes. It isn't going to matter if you cut a 300 student calc class. It IS going to matter if you cut a 20 student English class, no matter how easy and boring you find it. English/Writing type professors in my experience take cutting the most personally and WILL make you pay for it. Tech professors are sometimes more forgiving, but don't chance it at this point.

Also even if a prof tells you that you are likely going to fail and you are beyond the drop date do not listen. Tell him you are going to try anyway because you need to pass. Show him you are working hard to recover what you screwed up. See him in his office and ask if there is any way you can recover. This works more often than you might think. If it has no chance of working the prof will again tell you to drop the class.

As for dropping from 11 to 7 credits, well if you are 100% certain you have no chance to pass it doesn't make a difference. Part-time is part-time, you lose any financial aid either way and if your grades are already bad an F will hurt you more than a W (Or whatever your college gives for withdrawing beyond the deadline) will.

Another tip that won't be of much help this semester is remember you have a grace period in the beginning of the semester to drop classes at will with no loss of money or anything. This is important, especially with the non-english speaking profs. I have dropped a class before because I could not understand a word the guy said. I knew on the first day I would fail if I stayed there. Also look at the syllabus on the first day. Does the prof seem similar to one you have taken before? If so, did you do good or bad in their system? All this stuff really does matter. Getting the right professor will be better for your GPA than having certain times you like at this point.

If you do well on tests and stuff but the cutting hurts you the most try online classes. You do most of the work on your own time but you have to do it. Do not take an online course and not hand stuff in on time. Online professors are far more strict about this than regular ones. And unless the guy is a rookie "I had computer problems" is highly unlikely to work, even when true. They hear it a LOT.

You may want to try taking just the minimum to be a fulltime student for a semester or 2. Sure you will take longer to graduate, but failing makes it take longer too. Get all your easy requirements out of the way. They will get your GPA up and lower your chances of getting kicked out for academic reasons. Going to them will also get you into good habits for when you take the harder stuff. You can even take a class or 2 you might actually enjoy (But not at the expense of the required stuff.) At one point I took a one credit pass/fail course of BOWLING just to actually enjoy a class for a change. It actually did help my general attitude.

I could go on and on and tell you much worse stories of my adventures in cutting class and my former roomate who was worse than me (And was even called "The Ghost" once by a prof who never could spot him in class, would just find his assignments on the prof's desk but never saw a face until the final.) but I'll end with this...don't be like me.

I was extremely lucky. I fell into my job with the USPS, a rare job that let me actually save up enough to go back to finish college after all the money I'd blown on it. Most poeple that screwed around as much as I did would not get such a chance. You might not.
 
Ok, I'm an English teacher, and if you found one who DOESN'T require you to come to class, that was the singular one in the universe. Because, believe it or not, English classes are very dependent on discussion (you get points for), interaction (can't do it if you're not there), and participation (see previous comment).

Did you read the syllabus? Every professor notes if attendance is mandatory or not. Believe them. Oh, poor thing, you had a professor in Comp Sci that was foreign? How utterly shocking! If only there were another way you could get the information needed for the test. Oh, wait, there is! It's called a textbook. Read it, learn it.

Now get offline and go to class!
 
Let me give you some history about myself.

Admittedly - I'm a high school drop out. I was to graduate in 2000, but something happened with what appeared to be an upcoming lucrative sports career. Needless to say sports mishap + drugs + high school sucks = me dropping out. I got my high school equivalency, and went on to the video game industry for about three years.

I decided that working in the industry (although the money is fantastic), life sucked. I returned to community college and started out in some intro CS classes. ~4 years later I'm a PhD student in CS at a major university in my area of interest.

Two points I'd like to make to you given my experience:
1 - Not having college experience = not having a degree = working retail/fast food/etc = sucks. If you drop out, I gaurentee you'll regret it (if you don't go back later). Even though it may seem like things suck now, they can suck much worse, trust me.

2 - Suck it up. Attend classes and study your ass off. Don't understand the prof? Memorize the text and lecture notes and _make it_ make sense to you. Don't be the asshole who says "I don't understand the Prof so that means he/she's an idiot and I choose not to try in the class". Honestly - if you don't spend many a sleepless nights working on this stuff (since you are in engineering or CS), you won't make it.

So - you could not suck it up I suppose. But I'd look at the downsides before considering doing such a thing.
 
HEre's what you do:

- Set your eyes on the goal
- Wake up in the morning and say to yourself in your head that this will be a great day
- ATTEND CLASS AND HAND IN PAPERS! Even if they aren't your best AT LEAST hand it in
- Study hard...Study for about an hour, take a half hour break
-
 
[quote name='Spades22']HEre's what you do:
- Study hard...Study for about an hour, take a half hour break
-[/quote]

That's hardly studying.

If you are in EE/CS you should easily study for a few hours/take a 10-20 minute break (maximum). Otherwise to truly understand all the material you'd be up 24/7 on the study an hour take a half an hour break plan.
 
Whatever it works for me...I still get my A so... I guess some people need to study more though. I'm a crammer, I study ALL day the day or 2 before. I know all my friends think I'm crazy that I can do that...I handle stress fairly well. But I do still go over my notes, read the corresponding textbook pages, and answer the questions. I do that within an hour or an hour and a half, take a break, move on to the next subject, same thing and I'm done for the day. Then when tests come I give myself 2 days before to study and I cram everything/do online quizzes/ old exams and make sure I can answer EVERY question in the course outline and online stuff. And also I study all the definitions, unless they're science courses like Chem then usually they aren't quite as important as like Bio, so I spend less time on the defs, then I write and do pretty good...

It's all about not falling behind and reading your notes. Instead of being overwhelmed a week before the exam cause you know nothing, instead just read over your notes and know them each day, so you could already get like 65-70% on the test, then study hard for a couple days to get that mark to an 80-90%.

So really just STAY UP TO DATE AND GIVE YOURSELF AT LEAST 2 DAYS TO STUDY BEFORE AN EXAM AND STUDY ALL DAY FOR THOSE 2 DAYS AND YOU SHOULD DO GOOD! It's really not that bad at all IF YOU STAY UP TO DATE WITH YOUR WORK!

Oh ya and it might help if you could spell "college" :p
 
I also really hate college but ever since I took a personal withdrawal from mine so I could work to make money, I've become more motivated to finish college. Before this, I always figured that the only reason why I'm even in college is to make everyone else happy (medical school)...if I had a choice, I'd rather become a full time martial arts instructor (don't laugh). Now that I'm working, I've realized how hard it is to get a good paying job without a freaking degree. I'm supposed to be taking time off to pay off my debts and saving up some money for college since I had a really hard time working full time while maintaining the grades needed for med school but now that I can't pay for my apartment through financial aid, I'm falling deeper and deeper into debt. I want to find a job that pays more but for someone without a degree, I'm already making pretty good money. Trust me...a degree can really help you find a good job and that should be enough motivation for you to keep up with your schoolwork there. Also, I look at my parents; they don't technically have college degrees (my mom did go to the top university in Vietnam but a Vietnamese accounting degree is useless in the US) and I've seen how hard they've had to work. Yes, they did make triple digits combined when they were still together but they worked 12 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. I almost never saw my mom because she worked afternoons/evenings/part nights. That and although this may seem politically incorrect or whatever but in reality, people tend to give you more respect when you tell them that you've been to college. At my job, it's surprising how many patients are complete bitches/jerks to me until they realize (usually through my convo with another patient) that I go to Cal and then their attitude towards me changes completely. Just force yourself through it for the 4 or however many years it takes you to finish college and it'll be worth it for the rest of your life. Even if you don't end up using your degree, it'll still look good on your resume regardless of what you end up doing instead.
 
[quote name='Spades22']Whatever it works for me...I still get my A so... I guess some people need to study more though. I'm a crammer, I study ALL day the day or 2 before. I know all my friends think I'm crazy that I can do that...I handle stress fairly well. But I do still go over my notes, read the corresponding textbook pages, and answer the questions. I do that within an hour or an hour and a half, take a break, move on to the next subject, same thing and I'm done for the day. Then when tests come I give myself 2 days before to study and I cram everything/do online quizzes/ old exams and make sure I can answer EVERY question in the course outline and online stuff. And also I study all the definitions, unless they're science courses like Chem then usually they aren't quite as important as like Bio, so I spend less time on the defs, then I write and do pretty good...

It's all about not falling behind and reading your notes. Instead of being overwhelmed a week before the exam cause you know nothing, instead just read over your notes and know them each day, so you could already get like 65-70% on the test, then study hard for a couple days to get that mark to an 80-90%.

So really just STAY UP TO DATE AND GIVE YOURSELF AT LEAST 2 DAYS TO STUDY BEFORE AN EXAM AND STUDY ALL DAY FOR THOSE 2 DAYS AND YOU SHOULD DO GOOD! It's really not that bad at all IF YOU STAY UP TO DATE WITH YOUR WORK!

Oh ya and it might help if you could spell "college" :p[/quote]
Well - you are either in your first or second year, aren't in EE/CS/associated fields, or are at DeVry.

That shit works the first few years, but when you get into upper division/graduate level stuff, it doesn't. Problems don't take five minutes to solve, they take hours or days to complete.
 
[quote name='WinnieThePujols']The thing that surprised me so much about that email from the English professor is that, my attendence in my Composition class (60%?) last year was pretty much exactly the same, and I finished with a high B for the year. I didn't think teachers cared if you came to class, much less in an English class... A class like Calc I always go to though, or the computer class (even though it's not worthwhile since I can't understand him).[/quote]

They care, I took Geology 101 because I heard it was "Rocks for Jocks", and didnt show up on day one because I heard you can always skip the first day (it works alot). Well Prof Dickwad gave a popquiz on the first day on the next class, and then we would have to classify different types of grey rocks (they are just fucking rocks!) Seriously, if anyone here likes geology, you win the nerd crown away from physics guys, comp sci guys, math guys - I mean - THEY ARE JUST fuckING ROCKS. I learned two things in geology MOST ROCKS ARE GREY and WHO THE fuck CARES
 
Well I am first year...I mean I'm taking the hardest courseload though over anyone. I'm at school all the time, and I'm taking all the tough subjects. Anyway we'll see what happens....if I have to change eventually I will.

But I'm sure no matter who you ask, you CAN do good. You just need to ACTUALLY ATTEND CLASS and stay up to date with your schoolwork.
 
I started out my college the same way, not a good start. I took a 2 year break, got everything out of my system (partying mostly), transferred schools, and started fresh. I'm almost done with college now and I've never gotten anything under a B so far.


So my suggestion to the OP is to take a break to get your head in order.
 
[quote name='camoor']They care, I took Geology 101 because I heard it was "Rocks for Jocks", and didnt show up on day one because I heard you can always skip the first day (it works alot). Well Prof Dickwad gave a popquiz on the first day on the next class, and then we would have to classify different types of grey rocks (they are just fucking rocks!) Seriously, if anyone here likes geology, you win the nerd crown away from physics guys, comp sci guys, math guys - I mean - THEY ARE JUST fuckING ROCKS. I learned two things in geology MOST ROCKS ARE GREY and WHO THE fuck CARES[/QUOTE]

fuck, I can sympathize with you, I hate all college. I took astronomy as my science, I mean, I heard it was easy, how hard can it be looking at the stars and the moon and shit?

Our first test had shit like "If the Moon is 90 degrees in the SW position, where is the sun, where are you, what is the date, what time is it?"... it dosen't help the teacher is a major astronomy lover, either.

I don't even care because 90% of the time where I live you can't even SEE the stars anyways.
 
[quote name='Roufuss']fuck, I can sympathize with you, I hate all college. I took astronomy as my science, I mean, I heard it was easy, how hard can it be looking at the stars and the moon and shit?

Our first test had shit like "If the Moon is 90 degrees in the SW position, where is the sun, where are you, what is the date, what time is it?"... it dosen't help the teacher is a major astronomy lover, either.

I don't even care because 90% of the time where I live you can't even SEE the stars anyways.[/quote]

Really good point Roufuss - if you are taking courses that you couldn't give a rat's ass about, it makes school quite difficult.

Most of the first two years of courses are either bullshit general ed, or cup-check courses. Cup-check courses (like all the Calculus series, Linear Algebra, etc) are to see if you can handle the high degree of Mathematics for the degree. They serve a purpose (especially if you want to do grad work), but are difficult for a reason.

If you are in your first two years, just suck it up. If you are in the right major for you, things will get better and you will start taking classes that interest you.

The year before coming to grad school (where I'm at now), I had some lower division science requirements to meet still - which were (1) a huge waste of time and (2) annoying as hell. But, so I could finish and go to grad school, I sucked it up.

Do the same and you'll be fine in the long run :). Just no flippin' burgers, ok?
 
What your going to find is unless you live on campus at a university or whatever, your college experience is going to suck as far as academics goes. To learn that much, it helps if you have a change of scene to keep your school as your main focus, that way you have your change of scene to associate with school. If you have nothing constantly reminding you of how much homework you need to do, your not going to do it, to put it simply.
 
[quote name='Eviltude']What your going to find is unless you live on campus at a university or whatever, your college experience is going to suck as far as academics goes. To learn that much, it helps if you have a change of scene to keep your school as your main focus, that way you have your change of scene to associate with school. If you have nothing constantly reminding you of how much homework you need to do, your not going to do it, to put it simply.[/quote]

I commuted my entire undergrad career. I couldn't disagree more with the above statement.

I lived at school while I had shit to do, when I was done, I went home and dropped it all completely.
 
yeah, at home I would just hop right to my homework because there was nothing else to do.

The town of Madison, on the other hand, was created to keep me away from the library.


edit: and it's better to pace yourself by subject then by time. keeping track of the clock is the last thing you want to do while studying.
 
I'm in a HIS 672 course with a professor whose voice I can barely recognize. Regardless, he is an exceedingly well-respected scholar in his field, and his teaching has been lauded all around. I don't know how this stuff persists.
 
sounds like some needs a Red Foreman in their life.

"DUMBASS!!!"

seriously tho, i lost credit last year in my sophomore slump, but it was more motivation to keep my studying habits up this year.
 
Oh ya another tip: TRY to pick the time slots for your courses when the Professors last name sounds English or German, you know like something you can understand. That's what I did and I ended up with Profs I can understand completely in every one of my courses.
 
*probably lots of typos, grammar, and spelling errors. Too tired when typing this up*.

I could definitely use some college inspiration right now. :(

I'm currently in my 5th year of college. I started my first year of college at a small school in my hometown. I started out in Computer Science, but I really didn't like the instructors there for it and I really wasn't sure about it (the truth is, I told the college I had some interest in two majors, so they stuck me in what I said first, although it wasn't my first choice). I changed majors the next day, where I was a EE. Things were a little better as a EE, but the problem is that I was somewhat behind (since I never took Calc in H.S., I had to start out at Trig, which put me a semester behind. Also, my English skills were terrible, so I was placed in a lower level course). During the semester, I realized that I wanted to go away to college and possibly do something else. I finished with a 3.833 GPA and went onto the 2nd semester. Kind of struggled my 2nd semester, due to a horrible Calc I Prof. (Kept messing up on a problem and couldn't figure out what he did wrong), Computer Programming Prof. (It was his first time teaching it and he pretty much had everyone failing), and a horrible Chem II instructor (she just never showed up and just handed us stuff to do), so I dropped classes and was only taking two (English Comp. and Psychology). Only five of my classes transferred over, so I somewhat felt I wasted my first year in college.

I ended up transferring to Purdue (main campus) majoring in Electrical & Computer Engineering Technology. I tried to get into Engineering first, but didn't get in, due to my application being slightly late (they wouldn't process it until my grades were received at my last college) and due to being slightly behind at my last college really cost me (where I didn't have enough credits in Calc, PHYS, and CHEM). I decided to give the major a shot. When I first came into the major, I knew very little about electronics, but I quickly learned a lot. I started out during my first semester at Purdue with a 3.77 GPA. Now, I'm down to a 3.51 GPA. :( I started off doing well in the major (although Digital classes may have given me some trouble, since I'm more of an analog person) for five semesters (got my associates during my 4th semester. Also, I got an A in most every ECET class, while just getting three B's in ECET classes.). But once my 6th semester started, I've really slowed down and having a lot of difficulty finishing.

It started out having a really busy scheduling, taking three 300-400 level courses (classes that require a lot of work in my major, designed for Juniors and Seniors) along with a STAT course (not a bad course, but I didn't need much more of a workload). One class, a class where we had to design and build a robot with a group of people along with preparing our senior project, really hit me hard. It was the first class in my major I was in huge danger of failing (I wasn't the only one, over 60% of my class was in the same boat, due to how messed up the class was) since I could never get my portion of the robot to work (Only 5/19 people in my class that did the same portion of the robot got it to work). Due to problems with the project, I ended up coming up with a horrible idea for a senior project, that was completely rushed together. It was the first course in my major I ever got a C in (my other two classes in my major during the same semester, I got an A in). I ended up feeling extremely depressed all summer where I didn't want to do anything with anyone and didn't really want to talk to anyone. I ended up taking summer classes for I wouln't have a hectice schedule again; however, one class I did well in while the other class I barely got by in.

So this semester, I decided to go ahead with my senior project, but it ended up being a dumb decision. I realized it definitely couldn't be done and I was going to miss the 50% checkoff (only 17% worked and I'd never be able to be finished. Plus, I hated the project). I ended up dropping the course, so now I'm put back another semester from finishing college. The problem is, I still cannot come up with a decent idea for an electronics senior project (the standards are very hard, where the project must be somewhat complicated) that I'll enjoy doing and won't get me into trouble (and that won't cost $1000 to make). So now, I just don't know what to do because I cannot graduate until I get a senior project designed and completely working. In all reality, I've lost all faith that I can do it based on problems with my last project and just not being able to come up with an idea. To some extent, I greatly regret the major I chose and somewhat wished I was doing something else, like a computer programming major (after taking computer programming courses in C, C++, VB, and using MATLAB, I realized that's what I enjoy most and have a huge passion for it). Some may wonder why I don't change majors, but the reason I don't is because I'll have to basically start all over again, and it will take me another 3 years to finish college.

Problems with my senior project has made me wished I was never alive (don't worry, I'm not crazy). Some say I just need to take a break from college, but what else could I do (In all reality, I'm somewhat pathetic, but I won't go there)??

EDIT: To let everyone know, I don't party at all, never had a sip of beer/alcohol, and never been to a bar, so I'm not doing anything that many upper classman me do. I normally do my homework every single day and I never skipped or been late for a class before.
 
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