Computer Engineer (UIUC) with a 3.16 who wants to pull his GPA up but VERY FRUSTRATED

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>Hey all,</p>

<p>I'm a Sophomore Computer Engineering student at UIUC and I have a 3.16 GPA and I am very frustrated by it. I'm an out of state student who came in with only four credits (got to skip rhetoric). I also came it with very little computer experience and no programming experience. I think I might want to do computer science but the program is impossible to get into, and even if I had a chance to get in, I wouldn't be able to graduate on time. I feel like I study very hard but I'm just not interested in some courses like Physics Mechanics and Electricity and Magnetism. I also don't do well on exams and study more than anybody I know. Just very frustrated at the moment. I'm trying to get an internship for this summer however I've only taken intro classes, dont have much experience, and have a 3.16 GPA. Advice?</p>

2

<p>Studying more and studying well are different. Here’s a few tips. Hopefully they help.</p>

<p>Study between classes and not in your room. Many students wait until night. It’s a waste of good time and then frees up time for fun stuff that otherwise would temp you away from studying.</p>

<p>Do this in an organized way, by actually scheduling your time on a dayplanner.</p>

<p>Put your phone into airplane mode (thus no texts, no Facebook, no email, etc. but more importantly, no anticipation of any of those either) and set the timer for 30 minutes (longer if you have the attention span). Do your work, distraction free, full on, for while “on the clock”. No breaks for water, to chat or even pee. </p>

<p>When your timer goes off, stop. Take a planned TIMED break of 5 to 10 minutes. </p>

<p>Do problem sets, everyone assigned and more if you need to.</p>

<p>GET OLD EXAMS. Every instructor has a testing style. You’re at a disadvantage if you don’t know what it is.</p>

<p>Go to office hours, even if you do get it. It builds the habit. If you’re a star and don’t need the help, the professor will get to know you and will become a good possibility for a reference.</p>

<p>Exercise.</p>

<p>Go to student health if it feels overwhelming. College age depression is common, understandable and frequently overlooked.</p>

<p>There you go. Many of these concepts were stolen from Cal Newport who was merely summarizing the habits of very successful students, but have been vetted. Good luck!</p>

3

<p>I’ll second what eyemgh says and add that studying with a group is also quite helpful. You can quiz each other, learn from your fellow students and teach your fellow students what you know. You also have a measure of how well you understand the material before you need to demonstrate it “for real” on the test.</p>

<p>Exercise was also the key for me. I played a varsity sport and needed to carefully budget my time. Made me focus on what I needed to do and I was usually tired enough (i.e. no nervous energy left) that I could (and wanted to many times) just sit and study.</p>

4

<p>@eyemgh good call, especially if that’s prohibited, the prof notices the exam score went up dramatically from the previous year and reports it. That happened my senior year. </p>

5

<p>A few thoughts- when looking for internships, don’t just look at the big well known companies. My oldest son had two pivotal internships during freshman and sophomore years. He worked for very small start up companies who desperately needed labor and who gave him a ton of responsibility which then went on his resume. His sophomore year summer “internship”- he was actually paid $20/hr- was found on craigslist around March of soph year. </p>

<p>That said, you need to develop the skills that employers are looking for. Again- look on craigslist- under the IT section and see what programming languages appear in the Help Wanteds. Then work to learn those languages. </p>