<p>So I'm a Senior with 128 credit hours already completed and am totally burnt out from undergrad classes. I'm almost done here, graduating in may with a degree in mechanical engineering and minors in math and physics (will have 156 credit hours) but right now, I'm so unmotivated to do any school work. It's terrible. I'm just sick and tired of the same old problem sets, tedious group projects, and lab reports. I'd like to be doing some kind of interesting original research rather than reading a text book and and solving problems in the back. A company is funding PhD work for me so I pretty much have a career set and don't have to worry about finding a job after graduation. I just need to pass my last few classes with somewhat decent grades so they stay happy.</p>
<p>It's worse that the technical classes I have this year because of the curriculum sequencing are classes in linkage and engine designs, and engineering measurements. I'm an analytical solid-mechanics/thermal-fluid/nuclear guy and just don't care about 4-bar linkage dynamics or data acquisition systems.</p>
<p>For the past 3 years, I've been an extremely involved student on campus but this year, I just have no desire to be involved in anything except for this one activity that I got into last spring, driving 70 miles to the nearest major city 4 days a week to do.</p>
<p>What do you guys do to stay motivated when you see the light at the end of the tunnel?</p>
<p>I was in a similar position as you when I was a senior last year. I had just returned from abroad where I had an amazing time and just felt disconnected with the campus. I wouldn't say that I was burnt out from work but just dealing with undergrad classes, period. I stopped looking forward to sitting with sophomores in lectures. I didn't bother going to many of my organization meetings using work as an excuse.</p>
<p>What kept me going was just looking forward to graduation and the fact I had a senior thesis to work on. Even going into the spring semester when I could just not do honors level, my advisor kept kicking me along the way. She proposed that I work with her and she would create a graduate school level setting. Boy, she made that happen and made me feel that my senior year was really the highest point of my undergrad. She knew that I was getting tired of sitting in lectures (I was in one of her classes in the fall semester a-hem) and just wanted to move on.</p>
<p>If you're looking for a change of pace in your work and want to go for your PhD, I would just talk to your professors and ask for independent study opportunities so you can create your own project(s) that you can be proud of. Doing my thesis certainly made other classes seem worthless because I was doing something really different from what I was used to and enjoyed every minute of it. Nevertheless, I had to keep up with everything else, just getting by.</p>
<p>As for your clubs, you don't really need to get involved at this point as the underclassmen need to start taking over. But you can volunteer to help out every now and then. Just make sure you stay with your closest friends who will ultimately be your support network when you work on your projects. Hang in there!</p>
<p>I graduated with a BE in MechE in the spring semester of 2006. The last semester was terrible. I had a job secured in the fall semester but I couldn't let my grades slip too much. I simply took things one day at a time. I had a senior design project to complete but it wasn't very time-consuming By this time I had completed 4.5 years of college, so mentally it was no problem to go another semester but I had to keep my eagerness to finish in check.</p>
<p>I think we all hit a burnout stage at one point or another. I had burn out last year, and it wasn't even so much the courses issue as becoming bored with the same library, the same cafeteria foods, the same dorm, the same classrooms, etc. </p>
<p>I think a lot of people become tired of the routine of college life in general.</p>