One of the reasons why I decided to go to MIT was because of the education I would get here. The first two years here, if someone asked me if I think I made the right decision coming here, it would have been yes. However, recently I would not answer it as readily.
Perhaps it was my expectation on the type of education I expected, which it has failed to meet. I come here expecting that what I learned, I would be able to apply it. But as I go through each year, I have to ask myself what I have learned, how confident I would be in applying these knowledge I have gain. The answer is not very confident. Freshman year was fine because there was so many people to ask questions of, so many different recitations to choose from. This all changed beginning with sophomore year. You have a class with one TA. The readings are the same as the lectures, incomprehensible. The psets took hours and although you might get a good grade on it, you don't understand what you did. It just consists of hacking away at it until you get the solution. There is one good thing associated with this though: the class is small enough that you get to know most of the people (or at least who they are). Maybe it was this difficult beginning on which a lot of the later classes depended on, which started the downward spiral... It seems that the current sophomores (who had a different professors) was able to get more out of the class than I did.
Perhaps this was the cause of the lack of motivation I was experiencing all this semester. Perhaps it was because we were pushed too hard. Perhaps it was what people expect of you because you went to MIT. Or perhaps it was that most of your college life just consists of psetting. Everytime a friend asks what I have been up to or going to do, it's always the same: psets.
3 comments:
Sounds like you're ready to hop over to Europe! haha. Don't worry, just another couple of weeks and you'll be out of the country. And... you'll have different worries, like "where to find food?" or more importantly, "where to find cheap food?"
It's 2am over here so if I don't write sensibly... well, yeah. Maybe I'll write something better once I've slept but here's what I feel, at the moment. I don't feel like I can apply any of the stuff I've learned either. Actually, taking these exams, I've realized that I've learned not so much this year. Well, ehh... not maybe not quite as dramatic sounding but I feel like I will need to learn a lot once I get a job. But MIT teaches you how to think and solve problems. And I really appreciate MIT people in general. That tea party I went to, hosted by the MIT Great Britain club, was amazing because talking to alumni was cool. And... I don't know, I think we've come a long way from high school in terms of knowledge wise. Even from Freshman year. People from other courses won't understand what we're talking about but we can understand each other when we talk about stresses, strains, stiffness, consolidation, etc.
The one thing that I've come to appreciate a lot at MIT is that when you're feeling burnt out at the end of the semester, you might actually still do okay if you decide to punt a pset or not really care about your final. Not so in Cambridge... one exam and that's it. Doesn't matter how much work you've put in all semester long... Yeah... don't think I did very well on my last 3 exams just because I sort of just... didn't bothered.
hehe I like Lucy's comment
actually, I feel like I haven't learned that much either. But people say that MIT mainly teaches you "how" to think, so maybe we have subconsciously developed these problem solving skills...?
Also, I think maybe you just get kind of blue thinking of what you've learned in the field, because you're constantly interacting with Professors (who know EVERYTHING) and grad students (who can DO SO MUCH...how in the world did they learn SO much??) and it's kind of scary. I'm not sure about these MBA students...I'm glad I did a second major, I think econ is more traditional, in both undergrad and grad schools and structure. Anyhow, the econ grad students are amazing, and I just feel like I know so little econ. But I've actually learned a lot from knowing nothing at all. And also, you should try teaching stuff you've learned to other people (I don't mean just at Splash). Like, for example when Lucy came back I gave her a brief half hour run-down of stats and explained stuff to her, and I was amazed that I actually learned all this stuff from my prob, stats, and economics classes...
I agree with you that we did learn some stuff (but they're so hard to piece together so that it seems like we didn't really learn anything..)
I'm not sure about these problem solving skills... maybe they are subconscious and I don't know it...
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