<p>Meaning an ever-present fear of failing, an avalanche of work/studying, bad teachers, sleep deprivation, and severely lacking a social life (I'm not a party animal by any means but I do enjoy getting some sunlight once in awhile), being surrounded by socially awkward males</p>
<p>what u talking about, willis?..being an engineering major is No Fear ! No fear of failing, long hours of studying, no fear of higher Math, Chem, Physics, etc. In fact, I love the challenge and when the push comes to shove, I will rise to the ocassion. Then again, Engineering Major is not for everyone…just my two cents.</p>
<p>^^High five, welcome to the club.
My willingness to understand science has surpassed my <em>cough</em> less than helpful higher level science teachers (but let’s be honest, there’s a DEFINITE difference between the rigor of college and PAP/AP classes).
I felt that many of the people who made those comments were probably exaggerating and weren’t very becoming to challenge/ engineering programs in general</p>
<p>as awesomeirl said:
welcome to the club Bro.</p>
<p>I have not started college yet ,but I have heard stories about sleep deprivation.:)</p>
<p>I am a first year Engineering student at Iowa State, I am a non-traditional student, I am in my 30’s-pursuing my second degree, etc. All I can say is, it is not going to be easy and there are days that you are going to be so frustrated and start second-guessing your abilities, it does not matter how prepared you think you are.</p>
<p>I will never forget the day I got my first Chemistry for Engineers test back- my score was a 47- I was almost 100% positive that I had gotten 80% or higher. It turned out that the TA messed up the grading- so after reconsideration, my score was adjusted to a 67</p>
<p>Most of the kids in my recitation class, mind you, kids just fresh out of high school, many took AP Chemistry performed in the 50-55 range. I remember the TA saying “You may not be used to getting grades this low…”</p>
<p>Most kids could not believe their scores, I guess, because I am older and a bit wiser, I immediately realized that it is a weed-out course but it has definitely done what it is supposed to do- I would say right now, less than half of kids that started the course go to lecture(First day, we had about 130 people)</p>
<p>In my recitation class, we used to get between 12-15 people every Tuesday, now we average about 5. </p>
<p>Most people are getting C’s or lower as it stands- We have our second test next week and because he grades on the curve- a C grade is between 40% and 78%- so people who are barely passing right now also have started to realize that it will be nearly impossible for them to get a B or better after only 1 test!</p>
<p>I am starting to realize that Engineering is a great test of perseverance more than anything else- people who easily give up on things ain’t gonna make it, it does not matter how smart they think they are. Right now, there are days I love it, some days I hate it :)</p>
<p>Welcome to the club! Disclosure…I was up till 4am last night trying to figure out my assembly programming lab assignment. But you know what, it’s because you want to learn the material that sets you apart. </p>
<p>When I first took differential equations, I couldn’t do any of the homework problems right. I was getting all the wrong answers. The day before our first exam, I couldn’t “get it”. I stayed up all night trying to figure out what in the world I was doing wrong. I literally fell asleep on top of my work, woke up in the middle of the night and suddenly I understood it all. I hurried up to finish my homework since it was 15% of our grade. Got a few hrs rest, showed up for the exam…I ended up getting the 2nd highest grade in the class. </p>
<p>Engineering is like that. It’s like a rite of passage. But in the end you get to work on stuff that truly makes the world work.</p>
<p>The most important thing I learned is not to rush. It’s veryyy difficult to grad in 4 years. Even with credits coming in. Don’t take more than 15 units at a time and it’s not that bad if you can manage your time well.</p>
<p>If someone has over 30 credits, does that make graduating in four years easier?</p>
<p>Many, a lot of you guys on this forum are obsessed with the idea of a weed out class. I rarely if ever come across a professor who intentionally does things to lower the grades in the class. By and large, professors want to see their students succeed. The reason you see those early classes have low averages and high attrition rates is not because the professors are trying to weed kids out; it is because the average student coming right out of high school is not prepared academically and/or mentally for the rigors of college classes.</p>
<p>There seem to really be four classes of new engineering students: those who were never really challenged in high school and so never had to work hard, those who got inadequate preparation from their high school, and those who could fit both or neither of those descriptions. Three of those four types of students are already set up to be more likely to struggle at first when they hit those first technical classes and the pace and rigor is beyond that which they have seen before. As long as you have a little motivation and perseverance, you can come from any of those categories and still succeed. In college, the vast majority of professors are not trying to weed you out. They just aren’t going to slow down the class because you are struggling as is common in high school classes. That is a hard dose of reality for most students.</p>
<p>For the record, when I was an undergraduate I would say I fell into both of the categories I mentioned. My high school had some pretty lackluster calculus, physics and chemistry classes and I never really had to put much effort into them, so that first semester was a bit of a slap in the face. You just have to slap back.</p>
<p>So back to the OP: no, it isn’t all that harrowing. Yes there are long nights, lots of work, some bad professors and sometimes your social life might take a hit. On the other hand, most of us find that work to be pretty interesting enough of the time that we can push through it. Most of us were going to be up late and getting too little sleep anyway. For every bad professor there is almost always an equally great professor. As for for social life - with a little time management you can have as vibrant of a social life as you want. I missed only two home football games and maybe four home basketball games during my entire 4 years of undergrad and probably went out at least 2 nights per week and still did just fine in school, and I wouldn’t even classify myself as “good” at time management.</p>
<p>The bottom line is, just put in the work and you will do fine. If you don’t want to be afraid of failing, then just don’t let yourself be afraid. Just get some confidence that you are as smart and talented as I am sure you probably are and you will do fine. The school wouldn’t have admitted you if it didn’t think you had any hope of passing.</p>
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<p>Median grades of 50% on college tests are often by design.</p>
<p>While many high schools at absolute scales of 70% = C-, 80% = B-, 90% = A-, requiring tests to be loaded up with easier problems so that the C students can get 70% of them correct, large courses in college tend to “grade on a curve”. Targeting a 50% median score allows a more sensible distribution of easier and harder problems on the tests. Of course, encountering a test that is not 70% easy problems may be a shock to many students right out of high school.</p>