My daughter's first day of college, I'm mildly excited.

Whoa digi congrats! Is she the one getting DELL XPS?
The one and very same who started a laptop thread for college, but not sure if it'll be the XPS yet. She's still deciding, gotta look at a Lenova she likes and see what can be done with it. Also waiting to see if the loan monies came through yet, and I'm a little worried because my wife is going to the Jeep dealers to get her oil changed and I fear the loan may have come through and she'll come home in a different Jeep. :/
 
She's loving school, I am so freaking relieved and proud! Been a stressful week, but she's handled it like a trooper. (I on the other hand hid under my covers and cried a lot, but I'm not as strong as I used to be.)
 
also as a sort of related topic does anyone here have experience dealing with professors that just sort of clash with you? like whether it be learning style or just how they are. the hardest class i'm taking (for me) this semester is calc 1 and it's like, a combination of the fact that my calc class is at 6:30pm (i scheduled for classes 10 days before the semester started, it was either this weird later class mondays, wednesdays, and thursdays that goes from 6:30pm-7:45pm M and W and then on thursday it goes from 6:30pm-8:20pm in a different, smaller, and just generally kinda shittier classroom, or an 8am every day) and i lose a ton of my focus by the time the class starts. (yes, i am also working with one of my doctors to fix this... gotta call her again tomorrow)

so far it feels like she's just mainly shown us how to use our graphing calculators... which is great, i guess, because i have a TI-84 plus that was sorta passed down to me from my brother when he graduated that i've had for 3 years and i haven't really learned HOW to use it to graph, BUT i'd also like to learn about... y'know, calculus. the actual math. she also seems to assume that everyone is on the same page and has been sorta judgemental when i ask her simple questions. thankfully, however, there's a sophomore that's been assigned to our class to do supplemental sessions and those are starting tomorrow, AND i am working with my college to get a tutor and that should start either tomorrow or tuesday. (btw if anyone for some reason IS like me and happens to see this when they're also going into college for the first time: if you got problems with your mental health or with focusing on stuff or anything like that PLEASE try to reach out to your college's disability center if you think you need it... i know it sucks to admit you have issues but god it also sucks to deal with them alone... and i know that they can vary from college to college but remember that you have rights and if you truly need help... you fuckin' need it! you deserve it! you're entitled to it!) i think it's also important to note that my professor is older and doesn't understand technology at all, so when we have to use it or have issues with it (projector wasn't working right in a classroom the other day) it TOTALLY sucks and we all have to struggle through it. and the class moves super fast which SUCKS!!!

but my main point is that this class is the most stressful and difficult one i have, the other calc classes on campus (and at the other campus, i think... my college is weird, we got two campuses because these two colleges 'joined' together even though they're damned near almost 40 miles from each other?) are full so i can't switch to another professor. i REALLY want to actually take calc 1, partially because my brain finally clicked with math during my first year of high school and i actually kinda get it now (aka: to spite my elementary school principal who'd yell at me all the time) and partially because i still don't know what field i want to go into and what level of math it'll need... with where i am, with my schedule, i could potentially major in whatever the hell i feel like when i have to decide (i'm undecided. forgot to mention that. i keep putting things in parenthesis because i have a lot to say. did i mention that my dad raised me? he raised me. :p). i know that with the extra help available, i SHOULD be able to actually do this, but also sitting in that class for an hour listening to my professor talk is pretty damn stressful and confusing. she doesn't really entirely explain what's going on or what we have to do. and yeah, before you ask, attendance IS mandatory.

i also do want to point out that i know college classes are more independent work... i took a single AP class last year in high school (psych) but i think it was an incredibly valuable resource to me because it exposed me to that kind of format before it was the actual norm for me. but also now all of my classes are like that and my little peanut brain doesn't learn math all that well independently. the extra help WILL probably calm my nerves and help me be able to understand the material. but it also just sorta freaked me out because college is all very new and on thursday i got to deal with getting overwhelmed and having to leave the room to cry about it for a bit, too.

ok i know i keep writing and adding onto this (i think at this point i'm just reassuring myself...) but i also know that i definitely am not the only student who's having issues in that class... hopefully i'll learn more about it tomorrow when we have the supplemental instruction but most of the people in my class are also first year freshmen and have no clue about what's going on. i think i might just have a professor who's bad at teaching. i've definitely already looked for more resources to help myself out, but if anyone also has any sort of like... calc 1 math help resources feel free to let me know.

ANYWAYS too other than that my first week went pretty damn well. depending on what you've seen about me you might know that i really struggled to get through high school because of my absolutely garbage mental and physical health (looking at you, celiac disease...) and i still really can't believe i made it to college. that not one but TWO colleges accepted me. some officials saw my test scores and gpa and thought they were ok enough to get into college. i have a lot of big ass gaps in between my classes, but i've been using them to explore the campus or... i was gonna say just 'do work' but so far it's specifically only been doing calc homework. in certain classes i've been better about talking to other students and i've actually sorta been making friends? and i've also been trying to embrace the fact that, yeah, i'm a freshman. i'm confused as all hell. so is everyone else! everyone is anxious! i'm in a class that's just basically speech and of course it's kinda spooky, but apparently i write pretty damn well and i'm able to come off as somewhat confident? everyone is scared! it's the start of a new chapter! it's an absolutely huge transition! and that's okay!!!

thank you for reading what's basically turned into an essay. i think it's kinda obvious that i'm my dad's kid... i write too much and go on too many tangents. i should go try to do my calc homework before i put it off and panic about it tomorrow. :p thank you all for the kind words and support that you've given throughout the years, whether you know it or not!
 
so far it feels like she's just mainly shown us how to use our graphing calculators... which is great, i guess, because i have a TI-84 plus that was sorta passed down to me from my brother when he graduated that i've had for 3 years and i haven't really learned HOW to use it to graph, BUT i'd also like to learn about... y'know, calculus.

If your professor is good, they'll have you do things without the calculator a time or two and then expect you to use the calculator after that. The reason being is that while there is a lot of number crunching involved, the repetitive task of manipulating numbers can get in the way of learning the fundamentals of what you are doing. Basically, it's just REALLY time consuming to do it by hand all the time.

Also, you should check to see if your campus has a Math Center. Most good campuses that have a strong focus on the math and sciences will have one. If your campus does, that can be an absolutely invaluable resource as they'll likely have a math professor staffing it at all times along with students who have gone through various math subjects.

This is a great channel for understanding and visualizing what Math is.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYO_jab_esuFRV4b17AJtAw

This is a playlist for their series on Calculus. I'd highly recommend looking at it, even for people that have already taken Calculus.


Regards,
SB
 
This is a great channel for understanding and visualizing what Math is.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYO_jab_esuFRV4b17AJtAw

i just wanted to mention that i still haven't watched the first video in full, but i liked what i was seeing so i was looking through their channel and saw their video explaining what e to the i pi meant and watched it since it was really short. it started off talking about what e to the t just was and that actually REALLY helpful today during the supplemental instruction i went to today... i actually remembered it :oops:

so thank you for these, i'm definitely gonna watch more of 'em later on...
 
Sometimes things are just difficult and that is ok. Other times institutional issues are detrimental. Unfortunately, it is sometimes the case that professors are not as invested in teaching as they might be. If in a big institution teaching doesn't matter, only research so it is actually detrimental to their career to do a decent job (as it reduces the grant money they bring in and the publications). If it is at some small or large institutions it is just an adjunct prof who is being paid peanuts so they don't care much about the job. There is the goldilocks situation, but you need to be taking a class that is the passion of the prof teaching, or an institution that values teaching and supports the faculty to actually do it.
 
i'm waiting around waiting for 12pm to go to tutoring so i'm bored and wanted to mention that i transferred into a different calc class 2 weeks ago. long story, don't really feel like getting into it all, but my old prof is an adjunct prof (which i only learned what that meant a few weeks ago) and we were having issues. i like my new professor a lot better.

today i took a calc quiz in a building i'm never in (it has a lot of the admin kinda stuff). i didn't feel like leaving since it was POURING out, so i finally went and talked to the right person to find out about my DC and AP classes (only 2) and when i'll be able to see the credits i should've earned from them. guess who officially has 6 credit hours done... :cool:

it weirded me out to realize that with the 6 credits, if i pass all my classes (i should... hopefully) i'll have 23 credits at the end of the semester. i'm in my college's undecided program, and i think you gotta declare a major by your 45th credit hour. :oops: i'm in that weird adjustment period of getting used to college, which is even more difficult because of my adhd and shitty time management skills, but i'm getting through it. i'm trying to look at different majors and careers alongside my studies.

if anyone here is some kind of engineer (probably looking more towards electrical or computer engineering), do you like your job? what do you actually do? what kinds of skills are necessary? what's the work environment like? i'm not JUST looking into engineering, but it's probably the hardest one (and to me, most unknown) major i'm thinking about.

i think thats all i got for now. here's a pic of one of our cats that i took that i love. thnx

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