<p>KURT WIESENFELD physics teacher:
My</a> Turn, by Kurt Wiesenfeld</p>
<p>student's response to the last article:
My</a> Turn (For Engineers)</p>
<p>and exactly what is the point of referring us to this? Is it your goal to prevent kids from going to GT or is it just to reaffirm that making an A here is still what it should have been at all schools</p>
<p>I'm pretty sure that most students applying to Tech are aware of the challenging courses and the difficulty in obtaining an A. Most of the seniors that apply there are very intelligent anyways and expect to work for their grades in college.</p>
<p>
[quote]
and exactly what is the point of referring us to this? Is it your goal to prevent kids from going to GT or is it just to reaffirm that making an A here is still what it should have been at all schools
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I just wanted new incoming freshmen to realize that college is different especially tech. Have a complete different mind set from high school and develop good study habit + time management skill to get you through hard courses.</p>
<p>i would make the assumption that all/most of the people who have applied now have done so this early because a) they really want tech b) the first and they want to be considered for the presidential scholarship, in either case the caliber of students being accepted at GT are not the kind of people that need to be apprised of the difference between high school and college.</p>
<p>i would venture to guess you may have been the type of student that approached college unawares . . . unlike most of us.</p>
<p>well with 1/3 of people who entered as freshmen either drop out or transfer out of Georgia Tech, I guess your statement of 'caliber of students being accepted at GT are not the kind of people that need to be apprised of the difference between high school and college' really do stand.</p>
<p>if you had actually read what i said, the people who are on these forums ie the people who are looking to apply this early are not your average high school student. I would say they rank among the top of their respective classes and will continue a similar trend in college with this supposed 1/3 dropout/transfer rate consisting of little to no students from this bunch. Although tech may have lower retention rates than schools in direct competition like MIT and Cal Tech for engineering students, over the past decade they have put an active effort into improving this and now boast a retention rate close to 90%.</p>
<p>and as a college student as such a purportedly difficult university with such intense academic standards shouldn't you be spending more time studying than trying to convince other people to study?</p>
<p>You can read the retention report here:</p>
<p>Actually, 92% of freshmen return as sophomores, which is quite good. Also, of the people who entered in 2000, 77% had degrees within six years. The trend is heading up, too, as you can see.</p>
<p>i agree completely . . . so gtg, what was your point?</p>
<p>all major weed out courses are in sophomore years. If you include the percentage of students that were initially engineer major and switch their major after 2 years into non-engineering major just to save themselves from drop out(majors such as management, INTA, LIT and including industrial engineer ie imaginary engineering ), you will clearly see that 3rd year retention rate to be way lower. </p>
<p>Lilshamz, if you don't like the article I have shown you and don't wanna take my advice, ignore my message. I am just trying to warn the students who aren't as caliber as yourself(even though I think you are cocky a$$hole and first one to drop out of here) to develop strong study skill and be prepared.</p>
<p>thats very mature. </p>
<p>and i disagree completely. tech is one of the best options for me and i very much am looking forward to the rigor of the curriculum there. </p>
<p>i fail to understand why people like you feel the need to put other people down in order to make yourself feel somehow superior. all tech students that i have talked to seem to have a more positive outlook on the school and are less interested in making it seem unfair and strangely difficult.</p>
<p>lilshamz, i don't think gtg567 is trying to put anyone down. i am a graduating senior at Tech and many of my friends from Mgt were previously engineering majors. Gtg567 is right about having to be prepared and all that. I researched on Tech before I entered and thought I was safe as a Mgt major. I was so dead wrong. I nearly quit the first semester b/c of how ridiculous some of the professors were. </p>
<p>Having said that, I still bleed white and gold. I think the most important thing for anyone wanting to get into Tech is that 1), you know you will love your major to death and are willing to suffer, and 2) in the case that your plan A did not work, have a plan B.</p>
<p>gtg was simply telling another side of the story that tech doesn't. I had 5 or 6 friends go to tech for undergrad. Only 2 are left now after 4 years in engineering and only one has graduated. None of them dropped out, they just quietly switched majors. It hasn't changed my convictions about wanting to go there for my masters, but at the same time one can't be reminded too much about the tough rep tech has.</p>
<p>Edit: I apologize for replying 3 months late to this thread</p>
<p>Glad you revived the thread, since I missed it the first time. I don't know why anyone would be upset about the fact that the article links were posted here. To me, it is one professor lamenting the days of old when grades went unquestioned. What is the problem? As long as you can provide a sound rationale for the student's grade, you need not concern yourself as the professor. It appears that the professor's side was written in 1996 and I can only imagine the problem of whining students has escalated since that time. I am glad that professors with rigid standards exist, because they do help prepare students for the real world. On the other hand, I hope that this guy does not avoid students who challenge him about their grades. First off, professors make mistakes, too. Secondly, it can be a teachable moment. Maybe college professors don't want to be in that business, but I think the responsible thing is to confront the student with the truth and not hide.</p>
<p>reading those articles got me worried--do you really not have much help, not even from TAs and have to learn a lot of stuff yourself? And how much time do you have to study/do work per week?</p>
<p>I already plan on doing a lot of learning on my own. In college you can't count on teachers to help you learn. Teachers just kind of introduce the material, and then you have to go an review/learn it yourself. NO SPOON-FEEDING!!!</p>