College Is Saddening

[zapshe]

I'm a university student now - so I wanted to vent a bit. Incompetent and stupid professors, I honestly couldn't believe the stupidity. Apparently Christopher Columbus sucked at math and Abraham Lincoln wanted the south the leave the U.S., it was his plan all along! If I go any further I'll end up ranting about this professor, who is worst of all.

Anyway, I'm not in any Computer Science classes because as a Freshman they make you wait to pick classes, so CS classes filled up before I could enroll. Advisers were just other students who told me that a list of all the classes I need to graduate wont help me.. Like I should enroll into classes based off intuition or something.

Anyway again.. Calculus is easy, but I hate that they take points off for no reason, even if you get the right answers! There was one problem that was so repetitious that I visualized the for-loop that would have solved it for me. I was tempted to write the code and turn the test in, telling him to compile it and that he'll have the answer.

Not a day goes by without me wanting to drop out. I expected some intellectual challenge in College, but all I got was more simple work but with arrogant professors who can only accept their ways. I thought high school was bad.

Maybe I'm arrogant and sound pretentious, but this is me I guess. I can't deny that I think myself better than my professors, but it's not a baseless conclusion.


Anyone with college experiences to share?

[keskiverto]

I've never seen a college (except the Hollywood fiction) but I bet that the professors think themselves better than their students, and that isn't a baseless conclusion either.

However, generalizations are not good for soul. It could be possible to find a person -- maybe even a human being -- among the masses, who is not stupid, incompetent, lazy, or arrogant.

but I hate that they take points off for no reason, even if you get the right answers!

Are you sure that there was no reason?

Have you ever written a program full of undefined behavior that miraculously still yields the expected output (at least for one test input)? Would you accept it, if you were the professor?

[helios]

Calculus is easy, but I hate that they take points off for no reason, even if you get the right answers!

There's such a thing as an invalid method producing a correct result. The person reviewing your work must be able to see how you arrived at your results, and whether your reasoning is valid.

That said, there are times when evaluators can get excessively pedantic. I remember one time I was deducted points because I skipped explaining why I concluded that a second degree polynomial with known roots and a negative x^2 coefficient was positive between the roots. I figured it was obvious in a university-level course of discrete math/number theory, but I guess I figured wrong.

[lastchance]

zapshe wrote:

Anyway again.. Calculus is easy

Go on then, differentiate and integrate x^x.

[Ganado]

That's (relatively) easy to differentiate, but I've never been asked to integrate that in college, as it isn't expressible in closed form. But you COULD write its indefinite integration as a Taylor series, I think.

tbh calculus (as a uni course) is easy... it's easy to just memorize the patterns and get by by practicing the problems a few times until you get the pattern down. Really appreciating how everything connects together is a bit harder. At least, "calculus is easy" compared to when I had to first learn about proofs relating to polynomials over Galois fields.

Also RIP Galois. Died too young.

If I go any further I'll end up ranting about this professor, who is worst of all.

Luckily, with an engineering degree you can skip most of the bullshit classes. But there will always be bad professors even at the higher level "300-400" classes (idk if your school uses that terminology). I suggest going to office hours even (especially?) with the worst professors, it really can make the difference.

[zapshe]

However, generalizations are not good for soul. It could be possible to find a person -- maybe even a human being -- among the masses, who is not stupid, incompetent, lazy, or arrogant.

It wasn't a generalization, I specifically meant MY CURRENT professors. I'm sure there are plenty of them that I would not look down on like this.

Are you sure that there was no reason?

That said, there are times when evaluators can get excessively pedantic.

Pretty sure. An example of points being taken off was when on the homework he took points off because I cancelled out a variable being multiplied on the top and bottom.. A legal thing to do - and I got the right answer. In fact, he found a way to take 10 points of every homework assignment so far, and nothing he's taken points off for have made the least bit of sense..

I figured it was obvious in a university-level course of discrete math/number theory, but I guess I figured wrong.

Thanks for sharing, it's nice to have some stories to relate to.

Go on then, differentiate and integrate xx.

Not hard to differentiate, haven't gotten to integrate yet. Not trying to fight you, I just find Calculus easy to do - at least for now. I'm still in Calculus 1/MATH 181.

Really appreciating how everything connects together is a bit harder. At least, "calculus is easy" compared to when I had to first learn about proofs relating to polynomials over Galois fields.

Thanks for saying that. In high school, the teacher made sure that we not only got the formulas, but that we understood WHY they worked. I would see the math build on itself. This professor TRIES to do that and seems like a nice guy. But honestly, I can't understand half the things he says because his English is lacking. I end up looking at the formulas and such and figuring everything out myself.

Luckily, with an engineering degree you can skip most of the bullshit classes. But there will always be bad professors even at the higher level "300-400" classes (idk if your school uses that terminology). I suggest going to office hours even (especially?) with the worst professors, it really can make the difference.

Yea, same terminology here. Thanks for the advice, I'll be sure to get all the help I can from them if I ever need it (or can get it).


Thanks everyone for posting, sorry if I irritated any of you.

[helios]

An example of points being taken off was when on the homework he took points off because I cancelled out a variable being multiplied on the top and bottom.. A legal thing to do

You have to be careful when you do that. For example, this simplification, without any other clarification, is invalid:
x^2/x = 0 <=> x = 0
When you eliminate divisions by variable expressions you have to remember to evaluate the behavior of the whole expression when the divisor is zero. In the above example, at x = 0 the second statement is true, but the first statement is undefined.

[zapshe]

In the above example, at x = 0 the second statement is true, but the first statement is undefined.

That's true. I didn't look back on the homework, so I can't say that I didn't make a mistake like that for certain. Thanks for that, it'll be a good thing to keep in mind.