Academical woes and depressing administrative events :( (Cheer me up :P)

[Prepare Your Keyhole]

Yello :3

I'm sure that there are some of you who have had not so pleasant events happening during your academical phase of life (preschool ==> University). I'd like to hear your academical woes so that I might leech of your misery so i can feel better :3.

Why am I asking this?
Well I had a small problem when I tried to register myself in a Master of Molecular Imaging. I wanted to combine this 'Major' with a Research 'minor' but after I registered myself I found that this minor wasn't available and I had accidentaly registerd myself in a Dutch version of Molecular Imaging and not the English version that I would like (University of Antwerp, Belgium if you must know ). So I send a mail and today I could go to the administrative office to correct this error. While I was there they said that there was a "slight" problem with the Master Molecular Imaging as a whole and I should talk to the head of said Master. So I went over there and what am I told?

I am the ONLY student so far who is interested in said Master (Classes start next week). So because of logical reasons it wouldn't be economical feasible to host classes and practical courses etc... just for little old me (Alone in a big auditorium, no thanks too much stress for me ). So now I have to take another Master. I think I found a replacement but still I'm kinda depressed that my favorite choice is now impossible for me and maybe I'll end up in a Master and/or JOB that I might never truly like.

So yeah I'm kinda sad now so let me leech of your misery please O:3.

Well at least I'll get my Bachelor degree in Biomedical science today so I got that going for me which is nice.

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[Pinkamena]

Man, that sucks. I've had a few blunders. Got expelled for half a year because of me being absentminded and having an illegal item on my desk during an exam. Was an exam in differential equations, brought a calculator which I didn't even use once during the 3 first hours before they noticed it. Completely useless on this kind of exam, yet I was still expelled for half a year. Also, forgot to apply for a master course, which I guess was a bit of a blessing anyway since it forced me to find something else to do for a year and I ended up at CERN.

 

[Thaluikhain]

I know someone that did a TAFE diploma, only because they changed the way things were set up, she had to redo the first 6 months. She later went to work experience at a place that didn't like her, so she had to do that again next semester, so had to redo the last 6 months. 30 months for an 18 month course.

We were in the same course (well, 18 months of it). Very annoying, because I can't complain to her about doing courses at all.

 

[Chromatic Aberration]

I was actually pretty lucky when it came to administrative things with my uni: the state actually forced down the study regulations when I was in the third semester, immediately turning any written exam into oral ones. And I'm really good at oral exams. Then I actually studied abroad for a semester and brought home two C's in two courses for various reasons which I thought, would be translated to a 2.3 in the German system[footnote]The German system usually ranks from 1.0 to 4.0 in 0.33 increments where lower is better[/footnote]. However some other student had actually stirred up some controversy about that exchange rate previously which left sort of an impact on the administration meaning my C's were translated into two straight 1.0s. Not that I needed them at the end as I had like 40+ Course Credits (w. approx. 1.0) in addition to what I needed for my Bachelor/Master (which are 180/120 resp.) anyway .

However, I may whine about my Master Thesis: first I wanted to do that in the Biophysics department which turned out to be a pain in the ass as my professor wasn't able to give me an instruction sheet clearly saying what I was supposed to do or a place in an office (as is usual for Master students) that I needed to get any proper work done. Wasn't too much behind it either, yet still managed to ask my prof every week for a whole semester and he still never managed to organize both things. So I dumped that and went back to theoretical physics which I also had problems with as I couldn't get my problem solved, despite actually adding a whole year to my academic studies to get this done properly. At the end I just wrote everything I had down and still got a decent 1.7 on all 97 pages of it >_>

To sum it up: my Master thesis sucked and took 1,5 years longer than intended.... .

At least now I'm a PhD student with better prospects at the moment and I actually earn money doing so, so if that shouldn't work out like I want, I don't lose that much income either.

 

[Vault101]

the on-going conversation I had with an older co-worker and the issues she was having with her Daughter got me thinking about private schools

more specifically religious private schools in Australia (for context)

now these schools have an air of prestige for obvious reasons, and tend to have high academic output, I went to one myself because of the boarding facilities (family being rural)

her Daughter is in year 10, this is the year before year 11 and 12, in those last two years are where you do your subjects that add up to your score that gets you uni admission (ATAR they call it now, TEE when I was in school) her daughter didn't get the marks to do ATAR subjects, the school wont let her...so she just said "fuck it" and is putting her in a different school that will allow her to do that

and this got me thinking...in retrospect are these schools more obsessed with their reputations than they are the students?

because the exact same thing happened to me, in year 10 I performed badly (which was mostly my fault but to be fair I had a LOT of shit going on. Adjusting to a completely different environment for one) but I got funnelled into the alternate work experience based system

and you know I got nothing against that and for some people that's what works better for them (my co-worker pointed out that guys have better opportunities in that regard which was an interesting observation) but it wasn't what I wanted to do at the time

and I went along with it anyway because who was I to argue with the school? they wouldn't let me do TEE(ATAR) so I couldn't, its just the fact that [b/]a fuck-up I made in year 10[/b] would affect me for a long time after, it just seems so god-damn unfair...I never got the chance to do better

and that fucked with me for a long while after, particularly my confidence, I thought I was dumb, or if I wasn't dumb it didn't matter, I had a serious inferiority complex going on...I trudged through the last 2 years of high school skating by on the absolute minimum because what was the point in trying? what direction did I have? and no I'm not saying that's not my fault either, again I dug my own grave

I just feel a bit cheated by the system and wonder if the school didn't fuck me over...again maybe they shouldn't let everyone who wants too into ATAR but its like they don't even give you a chance...if your not brilliant by 9/10 then youre not worth their time

the funny thing is a few that went that route have gone back and got degrees (I think)

I know someone that did a TAFE diploma, only because they changed the way things were set up, she had to redo the first 6 months. She later went to work experience at a place that didn't like her, so she had to do that again next semester, so had to redo the last 6 months. 30 months for an 18 month course.

We were in the same course (well, 18 months of it). Very annoying, because I can't complain to her about doing courses at all.

wow that would suck...especially if it was around the time they raised fees

 

[Thaluikhain]

her Daughter is in year 10, this is the year before year 11 and 12

Really? You don't say.

and this got me thinking...in retrospect are these schools more obsessed with their reputations than they are the students?

Going to say "Really? You don't say?" again.

Has this not been a criticism that's been around for years?

wow that would suck...especially if it was around the time they raised fees

Nah, some time before that.

I later did another course, and two 12 months parts got cut down to 6 months, and I was in the first class this happened to. So none of the teachers knew what they were doing, one assignment became "watch the teacher write this and copy their code" (and even then people shared each other's code), another test didn't happen, the teacher just siad "eh, you know all this, right?" because there wasn't time.

 

[Vault101]

Really? You don't say.

I was trying to make some kind of context for non-Australians

Going to say "Really? You don't say?" again.

Has this not been a criticism that's been around for years?

well I didn't think like that at the time...the assumption that the school must provide super good "everything" if youre paying that much for it...I mean aside from the fact they are fucking ANAL about all kinds of BS (no nicknames on the backs of leavers jumpers) you just figured the school knew what it was doing

again, they made their choice what could I do? I was way too timid/emotionally downbeat to fight....I remember dragging meself into the office for the one on one session and I just said I'd do *alternate whatever* because as far as I could belive there was no discussion to be had

[sub/] I seem to still have some serious emotional baggage attached to his...[/sub]

I suppose the systems suits kids that are already academically minded...the middle of the road ones get burned
[quote/]
I later did another course, and two 12 months parts got cut down to 6 months, and I was in the first class this happened to. So none of the teachers knew what they were doing, one assignment became "watch the teacher write this and copy their code" (and even then people shared each other's code), another test didn't happen, the teacher just siad "eh, you know all this, right?" because there wasn't time.[/quote]

heh....

 

[Thaluikhain]

the assumption that the school must provide super good "everything" if youre paying that much for it

Yeah, common assumption for some reason, but it really doesn't work that way, of course.

I suppose the systems suits kids that are already academically minded...the middle of the road ones get burned

Eh, I think it's more suited to people making money off private schools.

 

[Vault101]

Eh, I think it's more suited to people making money off private schools.

this might seem counter to my little story of woe just above (and sound terrible) but I think one thing about private schools is they filter out shitheadedness, I mean people who refuse to engage or do anything at all, my main frustratiosn with 8 or 9 were the few kids in the class who would not shut the fuck up and let us get on with it

kind of like Summer Heights High, I know there was focus on the character Jonah but I had a reeeeeaaly hard time sympathising because those kinds of kids are just insufferable

again I know this sounds terrible and definitely biased against kids from certain other backgrounds...or who just have difficulty

 

[Redflash]

We had campus security confiscate our hookah once, which had a silver lining in that they actually had no authority to do so and my lawyer housemate totally served them with their own guidelines which they hadn't bothered to read properly. So we got it back eventually.

But there were some cool security peeps too, one day we were all baked out of our minds and decided it would be a great idea to roll our next j sitting in our kitchen... in the middle of the day... in front of a plate-glass window. This avuncular security guard wanders over, smiles pleasantly and says 'I wouldn't do that if I was you' and walks off. We laughed but that could have been our asses.

In one other notable incident whilst working at the campus bar there was a work party and one of our managers organised a 'boat race'... was great fun, everybody having a good time. Then a week later some little coward (who of course said nothing at the time) put in a bs complaint that he was creating a culture of mandatory drinking and abusing a position of authority to pressure the staff into drink... even though it was completely voluntary and he had nothing bad to say about those who sat it out. More or less everyone protested but they still launched a massive 'inquiry' (read pre-determined witch-hunt) and thus one of the better bosses I've ever had ended up getting fined and shoved onto the dead shifts.

I guess my worst experience was the exams though. They prove so little. I revised for weeks for an exam got a 59 (that's like a high C, very low by my standards), then procrastinated on another exam that I hadn't really gone to classes for all semester, started revising at 1am the day before and sat at 9:30am... and I got a 73 (an A)... and that exam was worth like 1/8 of my overall course so it really should have been harder.

I know I'm basically complaining about the fact that I coasted through and did well nonetheless, but even someone as lazy as me knows it shouldn't be rewarded like that. So yeah, my degree is not only worthless in terms of getting a normal job (I write film scripts though so that doesn't really matter), it's also worthless to me - zero sense of achievement.

(BTW I went to a very good uni, not just some crumbling diploma mill in the vale of sheep pellets where one might expect lower standards).

 

[Zantos]

I have to do 3 masters modules this year as a taught component to my PhD. They won't let me switch one of the compulsories to something that won't be completely useless for my research despite the fact both my supervisors and the institute director agree it has nothing to do with my research (which is the point of the taught component). I get one optional module that I'll start on the 29th, except I can't enrol yet and they don't know if the one I want to do is even running.

And the damn supercomputer is misbehaving. Bad high performance computing cluster, bad!

 

[Suhi89]

It was only fairly short lived (for a couple of days) but an administrative error on the marks of one of my A-Level papers meant that my final mark was a B rather than an A. This meant that I didn't get into my university of choice. It turns out that someone had entered my mark wrong onto the system and getting my university to accept me again was quite a bit of hassle, especially as most of the halls had gone already.

Worked out OK in the end, but I was very depressed for those 2 or 3 days.

 

[darkstarangel]

I failed a math unit in my first year & got the opportunity to do it during summer after finishing my 3rd year. Passing this unit meant I could graduate & start my honours degree this year. Heavy math's isn't my strong suit so I was chuffed to find the online classes a breeze, with really easy examples like 2x-6=32/x+3 & stuff like that. I walk into the exam & open a paper full of crap that looks like xlog8=64^x & other nasty stuff like that. I had to wait the most intense week for my exam marks, pissed off as I was convinced I failed it. Funny enough I got a credit for that unit.

The year before that,I did an organic chemistry unit which I really loved & understood so well. It was a HD in the bag. Come exam time I write down start time the night before. I rock up confident thinking I was 10 minutes early, turned out I was 1 hour & 50 minutes late. I accidently wrote the finish time instead of the start time. I only just passed because of the mid-semester exam our lecturer was a PhD student covering the class for his supervisor, who bumped my marks up to pass because he was confident I knew the stuff. The following unit, 'Drug design' confirmed his confidence when I got a 91 for the overall mark.

Needless to say, despite doing a major in molecular biology I'm now focusing more on synthetic chemistry for my post grad studies. Speaking of which, my honours thesis is due in a month & I still haven't got decent results from my experiment because it turns out the literature lies about the two purification steps. And because the reagents are explosive no one has been game enough to actually try it out, only refer to it in their literature as an alternative method, so no one has been able to call them out on it in 23 years. Academia every one!