It's Spring [Term] Time!
Okay, so having completed all the finals [or at least the ones I needed to] bu the predesignated deadline of 10pm Wednesday, I am being to reflect back on the past week with a grand WHAT THE HELL. So two of my classes were taught by the same teacher who in effect let both classes get out of taking the finals during finals week given we could get them done before reading days. Well for one of those classes was Statistical Programming which meant that the final was a program given certain specs.
Knowing what I now know, I think I could have taken care of passing off the project a week or two before I had. But for the most part the project went off without a hitch. Okay there was a particular hitch that I still think the teacher has wrong as it worked everywhere else. The other class from the same teacher was Statistical Matrices. In that one I had to produce a confidence interval to show from the 4 tests that were taken over the semester what my projected grade on the final exam would be, and with that grade what I was expecting to receive as a grade in the class. Easy enough, and it went well, I am expecting to see A's in both of those classes.
The other class that I was able to get out worrying about a final was my Teaching Statistics in a Lab Environment. It was a pass fail class where the 'final' was going in to talk to teacher and get ready for the next class where I will be teaching a lab for Stat 221.
That really left 4 finals to worry with. Two of them I played the math of the repeat class. Which meant that in all, I was planning on retaking them both, one due to poor performance, the other due to need of understanding and so after some careful consideration and discussion with people, I pretty much nixed them from my concerned schedule. That left two finals that I had to take.
My religion class was allowed to pre-write the essays for the final, which meant that I wrote them out Thursday night and then barely glimpsed over the notes for the class. It was truly amazing. I went to take the final and it took all of 45 minutes to complete and I was out the door. Then I began working on the evil final. Anything one that thinks a take-home final exam is a good idea, is kidding themselves. I began looking over the final Friday evening, and then looking at my notes on what the exam covered. I spent a good hour reading the needed section of the text book for each question. I stewed over the test Saturday night, Sunday and Monday. Finally I decided to get down to business. On Tuesday I went out and started the first two questions it wasnt long [2 hours] before the monotonous of it got to me and I had to escape. I came back to it early Wednesday. I hunkered down and went straight until 6pm. I spent a total of 16 plus hours working on the test and another 9 hours reading to take the test with a good 5 hours on the reading days.
I went to print out my final and got 3 pages printed to come to the realization that I was out of paper. Which meant I ran around looking for someone who had some to spare. That had set me back a little. So upon getting the paper, reviewing the printed copy, I went to turn it in. I put too much work into that class to be hoping that I just pass it.
Well the last two days I have been eating my Cookie reserve I made Monday to have myself a good 'feel-good' treat. With trying to get close to 20 hours this week as possible. I am looking forward to being done with the week.
That brings up next week. On Tuesday I begin the first of two summer terms here at BYU. They are 9 weeks of intense school work each, condensing what is normally taught in 16 weeks into the 9. Last year I dared and took the first term a.k.a. Spring term. It was an okay experience. This year I am being daring and taking both spring and summer terms. I felt that I could knock out 5 of the remaining 7 GE classes required by BYU in a short amount of time. Also my thinking into this 'bad' decision resolves around the desire to limit my exposure to âfresh from high schoolâ freshmen. So when registering for the summer I came up with a plan that in the original conception would have put me out of BYU April 2007 or August by the latest. I would end up taking the second part of Teaching Stats in a Lab Environment [aka TA'ing]. That meant I wouldnt be working as much for my current boss, but rather I would be working 12 hours a week for the Stats department and then another 25 or so for OIT. Its a crazy plan, but getting paid to attend a class for a total of 6 hours a week, with 2 hours of actual TA'ing and 2 hours of TA meetings a week didnt sound bad. The bad part is the grading of homework. I dont feel too bad about that. It just means time a couple nights a week to grade homework.
The other classes that start next week are my online Lifestyle Management class for my Wellness GE requirement [its a PE credit]. I have plans to be done with it within 5 weeks as I want more time to devote to my other two classes come the end of the term.
I signed up for an advanced writing class, well Technical Writing to be precise. This will take care of the advanced writing requirement for BYU and should help with my writing somewhat. That is the hoped outcome for the class. I have been told that the teacher is supposed to be really good when it comes to the class and hopefully, it isnt too heavy as other advanced writing classes friends have reported on.
Lastly I come to the class that I have been looking at taking for a year: History of Philosophy part 1. I read that in the course catalog as a class that works for my Civilization GE requirement and I jumped to take it [with the second part in the summer term]. I have been toying with the idea of adding a logic minor and those classes might help me make up my mind. I figure that of all the classes for the next 9 weeks the philosophy class will be the most intense as far as a nightly reading/work requirement upon me, but man am I looking forward to it.