In the long long ago in the way way back I was admitted to the University of Michigan. It was the first time I was away from my parents I got to do more or less whatever I wanted. But the University of Michigan was hard and the exams were cumulative. If I didn't get one thing it could and did screw me over for the rest of the semester so in the second semester I was put on academic probation.
The message was received and I swore to myself I would do whatever it took to stay in school. Most of the classes I was taking were repeats of the previous ones so I understood the material much better but I also took a computer science course.
At first things were doing all right, but eventually I started having trouble. So I started spending my nights at the library working on the homework staring at computer screens.
And my grades improved.
My middle bunch of assignments was getting 10 and 20 % but each assignment or so had about a 10 percent increase.
But each week I had to visit a counselor and eventually that counselor had to sit me down with a message.
Even if I was doing better I would have to do dramatically better than I normally did to pass.
And each week he asked that question. Do I think I can do 20-30% better on the next assignment than I did the one previous. If maybe it wouldn't be wiser to just withdraw from the course and focus on my other classes. And each week I would say I think I can do it..
I failed out of U of M.
I should have given up and cut my loses when the cost of doing so wasn't so high. If I had maybe I wouldn't have wasted so much time and effort. Hmmm maybe there is a lesson in that.
By the way eventually I defected to Sparta and got a J-school degree.
No comments:
Post a Comment