Help dealing with college as miserable failure

Parents Forum
1

<p>I can't believe I've become one of "those college students" that your parents warn you about when you set out for college...</p>

<p>Here's the downfall: I was a pretty good student throughout highschool, I admit I never really figured out how I did it, since I never really did anything, but I did it. I attended all classes, but I wouldn't do work in class, study for a test/exam at 10 the night before, wake up in the morning, study a bit more-- and then ace it. I admit I was never at the very top-- you know, always second... third... But the people constantly in competition with me were freakishly organized and disciplined, they'd same grade or one or two percent higher who had prepared for --days--... but I always, you know, believed in myself. I always pulled through. I remember though that my parents, although not the pushy-type, always told me that I was solely relying on my brain and memory to do well in highschool, and it kind of ****ed them off, because they'd always be like imagine how much further you could go if you put some effort in too and stopped being like a weed.</p>

<p>Here'd the second downfall: I am also very ambitious, I can't stay in the box, so when in highschool I went and took part in some pretty interests competitions and projects, and although again I didn't reach the very top in anything, what I did was pretty broad and pretty in-depth. I did the SATs, I did pretty good in some and okay in others. I figured with money I had saved throughout the years and from competitions to apply to any schools my heart desired. So I applied to the very top schools in the US <a href="hyps%20and%20a%20few%20outside">international/fin aid</a>, ones that I thought would even bring me more "outside the box". As you can imagine, versus classmates who prepared their applications for days (and constantly 'bragged' about how they had gotten this service and that to check over their work) ehem mine were pretty spontaneous, both due to my own habits, and circumstances beyond my control no one looked over them (except a parent here) and they were sent minutes before (and others... hours after) -- and in one case, parts were sent a month after I got called from the school after I had assumed they'd thrown my incomplete application in the trashbin. Come april? I got waitlisted, which would be pretty good, considering everyone else in my school got rejected, if it wasn't every.single.school from the very top the bottom. I knew that it'd pretty impossible for me to get off, so I had a moment of upset (okay more than that) and then picked up all my little peices and came to some random school that I had applied to for the heck of it because they provided good financial aid.</p>

<p>Here's the current situation: I came to school pretty independently, figured since I wasn't going anywhere special may as well make the least hassle for my parents. The school has a good reputation and stuff. It's a pretty nice place, but it doesn't have that "zing". I thought it'd be a good way to settle into college life and then apply elsewhere after a year or two. At the beginning I took a pretty big courseload, and some of the courses I took I was warned against because they're not in my program and more difficult than what people take in my program, but I didn't care, I knew I could handle anything. I have to say first year courses are a joke, it's all everything you know, a little more indepth. Throughout the semester, I did assignments, helped other people, had fun. I fell behind in some classes after I stopped attending because I was bored or had something else to do, but I thought I could pull through. By the end of the semester all my standings from assignments, seminars, labs, etc were pretty much perfect, on the sheets I was right at the top in a course or two... but our exams make up big portion of our grade, and let's just say exam (I have more left) marks that have come out so far have dropped my marks by four letter grades. This isn't very profound but I have now realized I am in deep **** considering I come to an easy school as a top student and completely destroy my gpa, and any sense of dignity that I had before coming here. Right now I am past the point of crying, I know/don't know what I did wrong BUT I never expected to be SOOOOOOOOOOOOO screwed. I didn't study as hard as I could, but I KNEW the material, or at least I thoughts I did the weeks coming into the exams I helped people who had lower grades than me, who now have grades higher than me by 1 or two letter grades!!! I am afraid I am going to lose my scholarships and financial bursaries... I don't know what to do... I have more exams but the grades I've received so far, every single exam mark completely failure, or close to it... it's not because I had a 97 avg in highschool and it's a 60% now, but because I can't belive I did SO BAD. I am sort of in shock, I can't concentrate at all. I don't know what to do, I feel like I need to talk to someone... do something... I don't know... any advice?</p>

<p>Sorry about the rant. :(</p>

2

<p>Go talk to a school counselor. A counselor can help you. Your situation is not unique. There are thousands of students who didn't perform up to their abilities in college. You will feel better after talking to somebody who has seen your situation many times and has seen things change.</p>

<p>If it makes you feel better, I have a friend that had a D+ average after his first semester at Cornell. Thirty plus years later, he is a huge success, financially and more importantly as a person.</p>

<p>So you will turn it around.</p>

3

<p>Welcome to college life.</p>

<p>You can't screw around in college the way you did in high school and get by. For some, that's a big culture shock. Plus, unlike high school teachers, professors won't give sympathy grades.</p>

<p>There's only one thing for you to do. Suck it up and admit you have to change your attitude towards school. It's hard, I know. I was in your very same situation my first 2 years of community college. I left, worked for awhile, and came back a much more mature person. You already know what you have to do. Go to class - EVERY class. Take notes. Plan your assignments and tests and give yourself plenty of time to complete/study. Seek tutoring if you need to.</p>

<p>You're not going to pull this semester out with anything respectable. Chalk it up to a life lesson. But you can come back next semester and do much better. In the grand scheme of cumulative GPAs, this one semester will not kill you if you do better in the future. If you continue to have the same problems next semester, I suggest taking a year off to work or intern to gain some perspective and maturity.</p>

4

<p>I think it is very common for kids who have coasted to good grades in high school to get a big shock in the first semester of college. Sometimes kids who have had to work at getting good grades in High School do better in the early part of college because they have developed those skills that you now need to develope. All you can do now is pick yourself up and change your approach for the next semester. It sounds like you know where you went wrong. And as dstark said - go talk to a counsellor. As for scholarships - they vary as to what GPA you need to maintain them and even the time period of the GPA. Some may be based on the one semester, others give you the 1st year. You will just need to check into your particular ones. Don't be too down on yourself - you can turn this around. Good luck.</p>

5

<p>Go talk with counselors and with financial dept. that handles your scholarship. Don't give up--you've been given a wake-up call and what you do with it is up to you. I too know someone who had around a .08 first semester of college (made an A or B in his PE class and failed everything else). He finished school and is very successful businessman. </p>

<p>Good luck with the exam(s) that are left.</p>

6

<p>Talk to the Dean of your college. First thing on Monday. See if you can withdraw from your worst class. Concentrate on passing the exams of the other classes. </p>

<p>Be ruthlessly honest with yourself. You've spent so much time running down the classes you haven't learned the material.</p>

<p>You don't know what's been taught--otherwise you could pass the exams kiddo. You are fooling yourself and that attitude will finish off your US college career. No 'zing' my assh. You didn't put any 'zing' into your academics. Wake up! The 'zing' is in the classroom at university--not in the beer jug!</p>

<p>Stop whinging and criticizing and start reading and prepping. Open up your mind.</p>

<p>Go to EVERY single class next term and work LIKE A DOG to pull your GPA up.</p>

7

<p>Sounds like the real world is giving you an invitation to take responsibility for your actions, omissions and their consequences. Would you rather have commisseration for loss of the old world where you seemed to be doing well but were really a fraud, or celebration of your transition to being real?</p>

8

<p>"Good luck with the exam(s) that are left."</p>

<p>Thank you... I think I did considerably better on my last exams. I tried to keep my focus. Hopefully I did better, I am on the verge of a teary breakdown.</p>

<p>"Talk to the Dean of your college. First thing on Monday. See if you can withdraw from your worst class. Concentrate on passing the exams of the other classes."</p>

<p>Thank you. I am not sure how to do this though... I failed my final exams (right in middle of the line), however I did extremely well in the beginning class quizzes, mid-term exams, assignments and labs so SO FAR my finals are Bs (at least I lucked out in that respect)... But there are still more results to come <em>sigh</em> I am still trying to figure out what happened at the very end. I am just very upset and frustrated right now, and trying to figure out just what my options and the reprecussions of this are (the scholarhips are above 3.5+) and I can't talk to my advisor until after the holidays. Meanwhile, I'll keep myself occupied during the holidays by repeatedly banging my head on the wall.</p>

9

<p>Let me tell you a quick story about my cousin:</p>

<p>In high school all he wanted to do was to play baseball and visit Death Valley. He did this every weekend and hardly ever paid any attention to his studies. He ended up going to a local community college and had a 1.7 GPA after his first semester. Then he woke up and realized this wasn't going to work.</p>

<p>He straightened himself up, got accepted to UCLA, where he got his BS and MS in Environmental Studies. He then went to Arizona State and got his PhD in Zoology. Since then he has worked for 3 different universities, two different research firms, and now is Chairman of the Forestry department at one of the best known universities in the northwest portion of the country. (I'd mention his name, but I'm not sure he'd want this story told).</p>

<p>The most unusual thing of all to me is that he never gave up his love for Death Valley. He has written three books about Death Valley and is considered probably the "expert" on Death Valley in the world--only now this is as a researcher, not as a high school kid--meaning people listen to what he says.</p>

<p>The same can happen for you. I'm sure things seem bleak, and you seem quite distraught. The important thing to realize is that you are worthy, and you need to have confidence in your ability to change things. As you pointed out, you have been tutoring others with higher grades. Obviously, they consider you worthy; -- you should too.</p>

<p>This will pass and things will get better if you work at it. Draft a plan to change things around--and meet with your counselor to get this started and to get things in perspective. That's what your counselor is there for--and I'm sure he/she will be glad to help you.</p>

<p>Best of success.</p>

10

<p>While it has been many years, I can vividly recall going through what you are experiencing. I did not actually fail any of my 5 classes my first semester, but I came dangerously close to doing so in several. I had been an all-A student in high school, with stellar SAT/ACT scores and a job on the side. I couldn't believe how miserably I was doing in college! </p>

<p>Over time, I figured out how to study, who to ask for help, how to balance my time, what I needed to do to concentrate, etc. I made Dean's List sophomore year, which was extremely hard to do at my school. </p>

<p>Sometimes, it takes a year to adjust. If you work at it, you will most likely be able to "get it together." It's all part of growing up. Keep plugging away, and don't give up. There are some good ideas on posts here; use what might work for you. Don't be too hard on yourself, but do take things very seriously. You CAN get over a bad first semester or first year. </p>

<p>Good luck!</p>

11

<p>deuxpardeux, you seem to have a pattern here of essentially prohibiting yourself from succeeding. You said that you've never worked hard, studied hard, organized or prepared and have always come in 2nd or 3rd but not first.</p>

<p>The first and most important thing is that you need to take total responsibility for your behavior and commit to making big changes. Have you spoken with your parents about this yet? If not, you should. But first you MUST go talk to a) your academic advisor (this is VERY important to show that you are committed to improve); b) the financial aid office to see about preserving your scholarships; c) your study/tutor center at your college to help you set up and organizing yourself and your work; and d) your school's counselor (?through the student health center?) to help you sort out why you have made these decisions to fail.</p>

12

<p>You are living an "old story". Some kids,(like mine) can even coast throught the first two years of college because they were so well prepared and educated from a rigorous high school. But most college programs lower the boom come junior year when you have to start taking the directed courses for a major, and even a very smart, well educated kid is going to take the fall if they do not have the organization skills and discipline to do the nitty gritty work. That is what you have to learn. Not so much the info in the courses, because there are many ways you can learn that particularly if you are smart and have a good memory, read quickly and write pretty well. But there comes a point when those things are no where near as important on being able to take good notes, keep an organized notebook and calendar, and know how to study and outline. Scheduling and sustained focus become the most important thing, not how smart you are. And my guess is that you are missing those basic skills because you were able to get around learning them when you were in highschool. </p>

<p>You need to take a light load next term, find a counselor to meet with you regularly to keep tabs on your progress and find a study skills program at the college. Many colleges have them because there are many kids like you. Find out what resources are available where you are. Then it is up to you to really work on these issue and KEEP them up. You'll need those skills to do decently in most jobs, particularly desirable one. </p>

<p>Sometimes it is a curse to be a smart kid for that reason. I have 3 kids who are pretty quick at learning and have great memories. The 4th needs to work at things and has to organize or study, or he just won't learn enough of the material to pass or move up to the next chapter. Though I felt badly for him in the lower grades, I can see now that he is going to have a much easier time than his brothers, as he has the study skills down pat. He is an excellent student, and knows what he has to do to get through school. He is not the very top as there are kids who are much quicker than he is, but when it comes to organization and stick-to-it mind set, he has them beat. He would be my pick in most races. THere are a few whizzes who may do as well, better or nearly as well as he does, but are much better at the aptitude tests who I can see will have to change their ways in school if they are going to get through the more rigorous courses.
You are in good shape compared to many who go down this path as you seem to have a realistic picture of your situation and problems. That is a step mine have yet to make, sadly.</p>