<p>this is a pretty futile discussion. every engineering program is different, it is pretty obvious who went to a school that was focused on competition between students and a school that was focused on cooperation between students. different schools can use very different teaching philosophies, so saying that someone is exaggerating or complaining too much probably just means you had a different type of experience.</p>
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This whole topic gets blown out of proportion every time it comes up. It's not that hard. Reading through threads like this you would think engineering is a horrible boot camp from hell where only the highly gifted or non-stop working machines make it through. That's what I thought back when I was reading CC in high school. It's just not true.
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<p>Apparently it is true for some people - perhaps not everyone. There is certainly a lot of literature that likens some engineering programs to a "boot camp".</p>
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For one thing, your grades are largely decided by major exams (midterms, final) that come around two to four times a semester. You would only need to study intensely as these approach (and pretty much everyone does). The rest of the time it's homework, projects, and labs. These you simply work on until finished. So it's not something like an exam where you might feel compelled to put in more and more time as sakky said. Yeah you really need to clamp down and study when they do come around, but that's only a few painful days every semester.
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<p>When I was a student, to do well, I had to maintain a certain level of intensity throughout. I knew some people who could get by with less intensity over the course of a quarter or a semester. In some cases, these people had better backgrounds than I did - they had seen the material before or at least were more familiar with the notions of problem solving for these subjects. A few of them were geniuses.</p>
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And there certainly is an element of "you get it or you don't" in all this as the OP said. I've taught the discussion session for the introductory course in EE at UIUC, which is something of a weeder - you can easily pick out the smart ones and the ones that are bound to switch out to another major. Sure time spent studying matters, but some people are good at this stuff and some aren't. It's not all a mad panic to study more than the other guy.
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<p>Hmmm ... I certainly remember some students who felt that they needed to study hard in order to give themselves the best chance of performing better than other students. Because grades were curved, you couldn't guarantee that just because you, say, scored in the 90s on a given exam that you would be head and shoulders above the rest of the students. And even in the case of classes with low exam scores, there were certainly people who felt as if they had to study hard in order to stand out.</p>
<p>Since there have been some comparisons to HS, one difference between it and college for me was that in HS we had exams usually every other week. In some classes, there were weekly exams, and on a few occasions, more than one exam per class per week. I actually preferred that because:</p>
<p>[ul]
[<em>]I perform better (on tests) out of short-term memory/acquisition
[</em>]it gave me a better sense of how well I understood the material
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<p>Some people don't like this because they feel that it doesn't determine who the best students are. Or they feel the best students will do well no matter how many exams are given per semester or quarter. Or they just don't feel that it's their responsibility to give exams.</p>
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Think about it like this: two students might take the same class, say advanced calculus. They may have had the same preperation in previous classes, and both may spend the exact same amount of time studying, mabe they even study together. However, one has a much higher IQ than the other, and understands the material much better, and scores 10 points higher on the exam.
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<p>I'm not arguing some people are inherintly smarter than others. What I was arguing was that people can become "smarter" through study and other intellectual activities. </p>
<p>It's not whether Student A is smarter than Student B. It's that Student B is smarter after taking that course than he or she was before taking it. </p>
<p>Here's one.</p>
<p>If Student A is inherintly smarter than Student B but does not study at all and Student B spends all of his or her time studying and ends up actually knowing more in the end. Now who is smarter? The person who has the greater ability to learn or the person who has actually learned more?</p>
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Apparently it is true for some people - perhaps not everyone. There is certainly a lot of literature that likens some engineering programs to a "boot camp".
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<p>In comparison with other college majors I don't think its unfair to say engineering is like boot camp. If majoring in English or Business is considered college than Engineering is definitely something else. </p>
<p>Personally I don't think it's all that bad though. It's really only those who drop out who have a negative view on engineering. I'd much rather be studying circuits than how to write a creative short story anyway.</p>
<p>Morethanever : that was a great article</p>
<p>I have been trying to define intelligence myself. It is a hard thing to do, as I have often wondered if it is even possible. Personally, I seem to be able to grasp concepts well, but with substantial work, and perhaps less quickly than some others. In realizing this, I have began to wonder if it is more important to be able to grasp concepts quickly, or understand them more deeply over a greater period of time. In respect to those who can grasp concepts quickly, I also have wondered if they would be able to eventually grasp the concepts even more deeply than myself if they were to devote more time?? Or if their ability lies in quickly analyzing problems only?? Perhaps these thoughts are even too black and white, maybe it is some mix of the two? Anyway, just wanted to say that I enjoyed the article </p>
<p>In respect to the original post, I can second much of what has been said. My experience tells me that engineering is very hard subject matter, compounded with a very competitive academic atmosphere. Even during breaks such as Thanksgiving, I juggle the prospect of sacrificing the time off very much at all, for I know that many people will be studying to get ahead and I dont want to be behind. In general I think that engineering does most certainly differ from school to school, perhaps some are much more competitive than others, but I would still believe that engineering will be harder than most other majors at any given school. Partly due to the grading curves, partly due to the subject matter. I know that if my goal were only to get a degree, there are many, many degrees out there that would be much more easily attainable.</p>
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I'll tell you this. Back in my heyday, I doing the final preparations at least 1, and preferably 2 weeks before the exam periods. Note, that doesn't mean simply starting studying. That means final preparations. Which means that I have already been studying for the exam throughout the semester, which means that I had already studied all of the material of the exam, and hence, I am now engaged in complete "practice" mode: practice questions and answers, drills, etc. {What that also means is that I had to constantly be studying "ahead" of each lecture, because that's the only way I could build up a 2-week buffer for pure practice drilling.}Yet even then, the constant temptation was to stretch the prep mode to even longer than 2 weeks, because my competitors might do so, and I knew I needed to beat my competitors if I wanted to avoid failing.
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<p>I did the same thing. I never did an all nighter. Lots of preparation ahead of time.</p>
<p>I have yet to do an all nighter either. I think most that do have to because of procrastination reasons. Though perhaps it will happen during my senior design project.</p>
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I have begun to wonder if it is more important to be able to grasp concepts quickly, or understand them more deeply over a greater period of time.
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<p>Everybody is different. When you work on a team, you have the quick thinkers and the deep thinkers (and others :(. People learn to compensate for their weaknesses, and gravitate toward their strengths. Signed, slow thinker who has solved problems that others could not, given time.</p>
<p>Engineering is hard I think because you have to learn so much as compared to other majors. Also, the things that you learn are usually harder than others. You have to take so many classes with complex ideas to learn.</p>
<p>does any of you experience any depression?
how can you cope with that while studying? and any anti depressants there
thats my only problem... if it werent for that i would study all night/day long
and get good marks</p>
<p>The harder it is to get the paper, the more the paper is worth.</p>
<p>It's the same reason actuaries are paid so much. They have set up this barrier to entry in the form of "hard" tests with variable fail rates which keep supply artificially low.</p>
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does any of you experience any depression?
how can you cope with that while studying? and any anti depressants there
thats my only problem... if it werent for that i would study all night/day long
and get good marks
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<p>I don't think it is really depression but rather side effects of the stress and anxiety. I know halfway through this trimester I was always exausted, felt anti-social, and just overall was in a bad mood. Since it only lasted a week or so I can't really call that depression. </p>
<p>If you are experiencing this all the time then you may actually have clinical depression which you should get medication for.</p>
<p>engineering isn't that hard... I'm an EE and I rarely study. The only time I open my textbooks is when I have to do my hw or the night before exams when I cram from two hours. however, engineering compared to humanities is ridiculous. I can't believe people actually get PhDs in Art History.</p>
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engineering isn't that hard... I'm an EE and I rarely study. The only time I open my textbooks is when I have to do my hw or the night before exams when I cram from two hours. however, engineering compared to humanities is ridiculous. I can't believe people actually get PhDs in Art History.
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<p>Well not everyone is like you. Most of us have to study</p>
<p>I think "you get it or you don't" still applies in college. It's difficult and incredibly time consuming for those who don't really belong in engineering. Needless to say, most of them don't make it through.</p>
<p>I agree with the above post.
"You get it or you don't" applies in college. The difference:
- in HS people take physics usually no matter what, so people not interested at all in going into a field like engineering will simply be a little apathetic to the grades they get
- in college people who are taking those classes(Physics, Statics, Dynamics, etc.) are declared engineering majors (i.e. that's what they want to do (for the most part)), so people who don't "get it" will put in the time to "get it". That's where all the time is put in. Plus if you do "get it", many engineering classes are structured in a way that makes you want to "get it" even more.</p>
<p>To answer the original post...what engineers study in all that time are techniques on how to go about solving problems...and solving problems in the process...basically...</p>
<p>Why is engineering hard? Because K-12 education is insufficient for creating adequate engineering minds. The purpose of primary and secondary education is to create a labor pool, not skilled workers. For this reason it is not necessary to teach problem solving techniques or higher order thought processes. All you really need are drones who can add, spell, tie their shoes, and show up to work with consistency and vivor. Anything else would be a waste of time to teach.</p>
<p>That being realized, the methods of teaching at lower education levels are not designed to create the right type of minds. When you enter college and engineering programs you need to be reprogrammed to think ciritcally, analytically, and creatively. You are no longer expected to take what you're given and like it, you are now required to interpret, translate, and build upon the knowledge you are fed. Functions are not just definitions or interpretations or pictures on a graph they become tools to understand and utilize. It is not regurgiation any longer, and that is what you are used to doing.</p>
<p>It isn't easy, easier for some than others. Yet, once you latch on it's hard to let go. You'll become fustrated with inefficiencies and stupidity, you'll understand the difference between effective and efficient and begin to wonder which to strive for, nothing will seem unatainable. Then, you'll hit the real world, and wonder... why is life so hard?</p>
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Because K-12 education is insufficient for creating adequate engineering minds. The purpose of primary and secondary education is to create a labor pool, not skilled workers. For this reason it is not necessary to teach problem solving techniques or higher order thought processes. All you really need are drones who can add, spell, tie their shoes, and show up to work with consistency and vivor. Anything else would be a waste of time to teach.
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<p>I went to college-preparatory private schools that ramped up in difficulty and provided a pretty seamless transition between high school math/science and college engineering at Rice and UIUC. Engineering was still hard, so I'm calling shenanigans on this reasoning.</p>
<p>It might be why engineering is hard for <em>some</em>, but it's not why engineering is fundamentally difficult, in the sense that the OP is saying.</p>
<p>Apparently not seemless enough.</p>
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Apparently not seemless enough.
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<p>High school was hard. College was hard.</p>
<p>(Spelling is also hard: "seamless")</p>