last semester my professors were extremely challenging, and I needed straight A’s in order to meet UCD requirements for their CS degree. It was mainly my calc professor who at the beginning stated " you will probably need to drop other classes to keep up with this one" - he ran it like it was a nasa facility and we were building a space ship, where we had tuns of ridiculously hard problems to do that counted for little points, but with so many, you needed to do them all to get an A. I know these courses are designed to weed people out, but fellow class mates would come up to me and ask " is this the hardest thing you have ever had to do in your life?" - I would reply yes of course.
I don’t mind the work, I love this stuff. What really got me down was his attitude. One day for no reason he told us " A farmers wife made great meals or her sons every day" - and started naming a few like steak, stacks of pancakes, etc. “then one day her sons came home to stacks of hay, they said “OH HOW COULD YOU” - she replied, well sometimes you give me no reason to think I gave you anything other then hay” - then goes “that’s how I feel about this class” - the entire semester was super awkward from then on out. He really made a lot of people who loved math hate it afterwards, almost including me.
His attitude towards the class and the amount of work he assigned really drained my spirits. It also took time away from my family. He would say “sometimes in college you have to make sacrifices” as he would hand out a huge stack of extremely challenging series questions and assign online homework and a exam review before thanks giving break (which was one 4 day weekend) - the people who needed A’s just didn’t spend that time with their family’s…
It was nearly impossible to keep up with all courses but I ended up getting A’s in everything, which included that calc course, OOP with C++, and discrete structures. I really gave it all I had to get those grades and it’s been hard to bounce back this semester. I nearly lost all my drive and passion. I am going to school for computer science because I want to develop games, something I was fired up about and willing to work hard for. I found out I loved math and programming in the process. I want that drive back but have nearly completely lost it. Today I got my IGETC confirmed and will graduate with an AS this semester and could nearly care less. I feel all that work wasn’t worth missing time with my dog and my family. I feel like I am working hard towards A’s and getting nowhere.
I looked on rate my professor and found people feeling the same way. One person even said he changed majors from math to something else… Another said “glad to see all these bad reviews coming in, at the beginning I felt like I was alone in this and like maybe I wasn’t good at this but to see so many others feel the same way makes me feel better”[paraphrased] - When I read that I felt reassured it wasn’t just me who felt this way. I really have never experience something like this before.
I know a bunch of people went to the dean about this guy but idk what happened about that. Apparently he told the other calc course they “were obviously the weaker class” and would insult them directly. Students in the math club told me “he hated that class” - idk what kind of professor would say such a thing, but I hope the dean took the student serious. I went to the dean because he didn’t accept work I turned in early that got turned back to us ten minutes after it was “due” , because I told him I turned it in early on accident and he purposely said turn it in then handed out the other assignment(I turned it in with the assignment he handed back early on accident) so I couldn’t turn it in - and the dean could care less.
Has anyone experienced something similar I could talk to? Any one else feel like they can’t achieve their dreams? I feel like I don’t even want to try anymore… I have lost my love and passion for this and I want it back!
I really don’t want to post this since it is such a rambling mess but that’s how I feel inside, I can’t put this together and don’t know how to move on - I have never been through something so challenging and don’t know how to bounce back, I was hoping venting here would help and maybe others have been through something similar that could relate.
This semester I have calc 3, data structures, and my last two GE courses before I graduate with AS and transfer to UC - and want to strive through it but don’t have much left in the tank. I feel drowsy all the time and unmotivated to do the work. I look back and wonder how I was able to achieve doing the amount of work I did, and it was all for the dream of making a video game. After spending all that time and not being able to create a game yet makes me feel useless.
I really don’t know how I feel about posting this I didn’t know it would come out so long - and I really don’t want to get hated on, I don’t know how it is on this site and this is my first post - As a disclaimer I would like to add I have experience with a lot of different professors and have only received A’s my past 5 semesters, so I don’t think it’s normal for me to feel this way, as every semester has been an amazing experience up until this point.
- I have a professor this semester that I had before and he is amazing. He is funny, uplifting, and really gives the best explanations. We had our first class yesterday and it really made me reflect.