Going Back to school... tips for success?

Ccfuchs wrote:

Focus on the question: why? Don't memorize systems or procedures. Focus on understanding the core concepts. Always know why you are doing what you are doing. Learn how you learn. 

This 1000%. 

It is not about learning how to do a job. College IS NOT JOB TRAINING! - at least in the sense of learning a trade. It's to teach concepts in a particular field; it's to teach you how to think and reason; it's to teach you how to keep learning for the rest of your life.

For example, if you're getting a degree in computer science, you're going to write a lot of code in a specific programming language, but you're not learning a language for a job. You're learning how to create and implement algorithms and how to learn any programming language, including ones that haven't been developed yet.

One other bit of advice - if/when you pick a specific subject area, know what else may be involved. Lots of potential comp sci majors are stunned when they realize how much math is required.

OP: Are you going back to school in you current location (Rexburg), or is location undetermined?

If still considering location, my experience in school was that being conveniently located as close as possible to climbing was hugely beneficial - as long as you had reasonable self control to know when to go climbing and when to study. If you can organize your time well, having nearby climbing allows you good balance - you can put in a full day of school work and still get in a quick weekday outdoor bouldering session. Or on a weekend you can get in a full morning of school work, then have a full afternoon climbing session. Having these two things - school and climbing - in close proximity can make it possible to have both. It helps to prioritize convenient and accessible climbing (such as local bouldering and sport climbing) over the pursuit of bigger objectives - do the climbing that fits best into your schedule.

You can also use the climbing/skiing as a motivator to improve focus on school. I would set specific goals to complete schoolwork tasks, and I'd only get to go climbing/skiing if the assignment got done. This made me very efficient - if I needed to finish the problem set or paper on Friday night so I could ski on Saturday, you can bet that it got done.  

In can backfire for some people though, and they just end up going climbing and skiing all the time and skipping the schoolwork. They key variable is you - do you have the self control to do the schoolwork when you need to, even if it is a good day for climbing or skiing? I know people who have made the choice to go to school far from climbing, since they knew that they didn't have the self-control to balance the two things. Worked for them; wouldn't work for me.

Marc801 C wrote:

It is not about learning how to do a job. College IS NOT JOB TRAINING! - at least in the sense of learning a trade. It's to teach concepts in a particular field; it's to teach you how to think and reason; it's to teach you how to keep learning for the rest of your life.

 Lots of potential comp sci majors are stunned when they realize how much math is required.

If it is all about learning how to think and reason, then college is a waste of money.

Math is job training, and a hard skill learned in college. 

Look at almost any employment ad for engineers (or any other occupation) and they want very specific skills. They don't want to train you. They certainly expect you to grow and learn on the job. This is true for laborers, tradesmen, and college grads. 

Most college grads aren't doing anything new or newly challenging. They are teaching math, running a hotel, managing property, selling real estate, doing accounting, etc. Tell me how many nurses and dentists don't need very specific skills.

I wonder how many of the people offering advice here have actually experienced a similar situation and been successful...

Dropped out of my top-10 school honors mech E program after taking thermo for the 3rd time. I had a vague plan that I was going to change my major to geology and meet cool hippy chicks, but I ended up spending all my time mountain biking, rock climbing, and partying. After a year or two it became apparent that wasn't going to be a feasible long term lifestyle, so I somehow got my shit together and got back in school. Finished the last two years with straight As, eventually went on to get a masters degree.

The only advice I'll offer, based on my experience:

1) You already made the hard decision to go back. Stay committed.

2) School first. Always. 

The rest will fall into place if you keep school the main thing. Yeah, it may hurt your outdoor activity, but if you don't approach it with that attitude you're wasting your time and money. But, if you're taking a reasonable course load there should be plenty of opportunity to get outside if you're disciplined. Just know that you may have to miss out on a perfect climbing/skiing/biking/whatever day to finish some school work, and be mentally prepared for that.

My $0.02, as a guy who went to school for 7 years to get an undergrad degree! 

("A lot of people go to school for seven years!" "yeah, they're called doctors...")

College is Runout Slab.  You're committed and there is no going back.

Climbing isn't all or nothing. Yeah, if you have to drive somewhere, you'll need to block out some time. But if the place has a climbing gym? You can hop on some bouldering any small slice of time they're open.

You're in Rexburg, so nothin you don't already know about in Idaho. But for others reading this? Don't just think about what is available in that area, if you are picking a school, but see what the school itself offers. Universities are places to gain exposure to all sorts of things. Here, BSU has a pretty legit outdoor program, including half day to multiday trips. They have all the equipment, you just need to have clothes for whatever. I did an intro to xcountry skiing (I got to be a "student" because I was a routesetter in their climbing gym), which let me know to not bother with anything involving skis, lol! Pretty much every thing anyone enjoys doing here, they offer, at least the obvious stuff. Skiing, mountain biking, climbing, whitewater rafting, etc. A long list.

I'm sure there's equivalent sorts of programs pretty much anywhere, maybe not the specifics, but opportunities to try things with close to zero commitment or expense.

Best, Helen

My perspective as university faculty - pick a major with good job prospects. Read the textbook. Go to office hours, even if you don’t think that you need to. Study with people who are smarter than you. The peer group and access to faculty are most of what you are paying for.

sleep more than you study. 

study more than you climb. 

climb as much as you can

Teton Climber wrote:

Look at almost any employment ad for engineers (or any other occupation) and they want very specific skills. They don't want to train you. They certainly expect you to grow and learn on the job.

Engineering school gives you: a) conceptual background that helps you to be successful as an engineer. b) trains your brain to be able to perform the mental gymnastics required. How often are you doing la place transforms in your workplace? Lol

Engineering school doesn't usually give you the skills you need to be successful as an engineer. Ie: true Autocad proficiency, real world experience of the process in which things are built

The skills that are required are learned on the job (as you state above). This is why getting an internship as soon as possible is so important. Being a detail oriented, enthusiastic, engineering student affords you the opportunity to get an internship, so you graduate with both the educational and real-work skills needed to be successful. 

Max R wrote:

Study with people who are smarter than you.

This 10,000%

Invest in a mobile wireless hotspot so you can work on class assignments during downtime during climbing trips, on the road if someone else drives, etc. Since you mentioned that you dropped out a few years ago and are now returning, I’m assuming that you’re balancing some amount of work along with school and climbing. Definitely anything you can do to multitask will help (e.g., watch coursework videos while working, listen to recorded lectures while driving to your climbs, make a friend drive while you complete class assignments, etc).

Marc801 C wrote:

That will really cut down on his climbing!

• very selective admissions, with only a 14% acceptance rate
• 3.89 GPA - compensating SAT/ACT scores if lower
• And their block plan is very different than the typical semester plan at other schools. My brother in-law  went there (he's now a physics professor with an endowed chair) and said it was incredibly intense.

 

Ed Webster, Will Gadd, and Renan Ozturk and many other outdoor adventurers would disagree.

Teton Climber wrote:

If it is all about learning how to think and reason, then college is a waste of money.

I disagree.

Math is job training, and a hard skill learned in college.

When I mentioned math as an example in comp sci, it doesn't mean computational arithmetic. Instead, think functions, set theory, group theory and fields and manifolds, NP-complete problems, computability theory, formal languages, automata, et al. Most of that won't actually be used on the job, but understanding it is essential when things like block-chain and AI applications are being invented.

 Look at almost any employment ad for engineers (or any other occupation) and they want very specific skills. They don't want to train you. They certainly expect you to grow and learn on the job. This is true for laborers, tradesmen, and college grads.

Of course. That's why there are internships and entry level jobs. College gives you the ability to grow and learn on the job and on your own.

 Most college grads aren't doing anything new or newly challenging. They are teaching math, running a hotel, managing property, selling real estate, doing accounting, etc. Tell me how many nurses and dentists don't need very specific skills.

Obviously (I knew someone would nitpick the semantics). Nursing, dentistry, doctoring of all types - those aren't learned or taught in college; they're taught in trade schools called med school that occurs after undergrad college. But of course you need that undergrad knowledge to begin to understand med school.

Marc801 C wrote:

I disagree.

Of course.   

If you want to spend 80k learning how to think and reason, go for it. Given how many college students don't seem capable of actually thinking and reasoning in practical common-sense ways, I am not so sure college is even worthy of being labeled as a place to obtain such enlightenment. Genetics or upbringing may be far more valuable. 

Under your take on the issue, it would be OK to erase everything you learned in college from your mind before starting a job with an engineering company because all you need is the ability to think and reason. That might work for liberal arts majors.

Try passing a CPA exam, a PE Civil exam, or any almost exam without hard skills learned in college. Have you ever looked at a PE exam? I have done every problem in NCEES PE Civil Reference Handbook/Study Guides. Ain't doing that without serious study learning hard facts.

Teton Climber wrote:

Of course.   

If you want to spend 80k learning how to think and reason, go for it. Given how many college students don't seem capable of actually thinking and reasoning in practical common-sense ways, I am not so sure college is even worthy of being labeled as a place to obtain such enlightenment. Genetics or upbringing may be far more valuable. 

Thinking and reasoning within the context of a given field of study. We're not talking about sociology majors or social media influencers who are now suddenly epidemiology experts thanks to Facebook University.

Under your take on the issue, it would be OK to erase everything you learned in college from your mind before starting a job with an engineering company because all you need is the ability to think and reason. That might work for liberal arts majors.

Try passing a CPA exam, a PE Civil exam, or any almost exam without hard skills learned in college. Have you ever looked at a PE exam? I have done every problem in NCEES PE Civil Reference Handbook/Study Guides. Ain't doing that without serious study learning hard facts.

No, you missed my point entirely. Learning the foundational knowledge is what enables you to study and learn the "hard facts".

Using a personal example, I'm a usability/user experience researcher and designer. I know what a GOMS analysis is, but have never once used it in a job outside of grad school. BUT, knowing and understanding what it is informed empirical observations during qualitative usability studies.

Irreverent Bastard wrote:

I dropped out of university a couple of years back for various reasons and have decided to return. Any tips or tricks on how to balance school while still being able to climb/ski?

1st off--been there, crawled my way back after 4 yrs. it's a big decision, congratulations (-:

2nd--time management & routine. something i found that helped my coursework/life balance a lot when i was wrapping up my BA and then in grad school was deliberately scheduling all of my classes & part-time work hours M-Th. having a free weekday helped so much in scheduling stuff like doctors appointments, meetings, etc, and a 3-day weekend to use to travel short distances or go camping. that ended up making me a lot more motivated to get stuff done after work+classes M-Th; even if that would end up being me getting up between 6 and 7 and going to bed around 11 or midnight after classes, studying, job, etc.

Irreverent Bastard wrote:

I dropped out of university a couple of years back for various reasons and have decided to return. Any tips or tricks on how to balance school while still being able to climb/ski?

I was fortunate enough to hold down a part time job at a local climbing gym when I was in school so I had somewhere to train for free pretty much whenever I wanted. Like everyone else said just be disciplined about it. If you want to commit a lot of time to climbing (I.e. afternoons at a local cliff or being in the gym every evening you’ll have to wake up very early to do school work or stay up very late.

It’s hard to find a schedule because being a college student doesn’t exactly give you a lot of consistency in your life 

What are you going to school for?

If it’s not an absolute rock solid money maker, consider that it’s probably not worth it.

For my money, that leaves computers and medicine. Otherwise I think it would be wise to follow the advice up thread of the electrician or plumber pathway.

For climbing, as long as you live within a few hours of climbing, it’s better than work. Flash cards around the campfire, having a same major partner to quiz each other on drives, focus. I got a ton done during school. There are built in vacations even. For work, not so much unless you are a teacher.

23 credits was my most but usually right around 20. Stop screwing around and get it done. Unless you have a way to make school free, then hang out as long as possible.

highaltitudeflatulentexpulsion wrote:

For my money, that leaves computers and medicine.

Law, finance, engineering (mechanical and electrical), marketing, a few others.

Max R wrote:

My perspective as university faculty - pick a major with good job prospects. Read the textbook. Go to office hours, even if you don’t think that you need to. Study with people who are smarter than you. The peer group and access to faculty are most of what you are paying for.

As another longtime faculty member, I second this — especially the office hours thing.  Very important and underutilized.  By all means study with smarter people.  But also study with students less skilled than you.  By teaching them the material, your own learning will benefit a great deal.