College advice

I was accepted into a prestigious school and had a tough 1 st semester. In order to continue I need straight A scores. My main hang up was and is calculus. This is my road block. I'm not quite sure what I should do.

Why straight A's? I went to a fairly tough science/technical school, and granulated with a 3.65/4.00. Perfectly stellar, to lots of folk. Lots of freshmen/women have a tough time with calculus; won't say it was easy for me either. Just keep with it....you'll be surprised at what you will pick up on with the right attitude.

And, at that college, we had a feela in my class from Berkeley, CA. Looked like a typical surfer dude, seemed lazy. Well, his dad was a Berkeley prof. He got 4 of the toughest degrees at the time (math, physics, ceramics engineering, and metallurgical engineering), did in 4 years time, with a 4.00 average. Think of how the rest of us felt, especially if he was in one of our classes. Again, this is your first semester? Sit back, take a deep breath, and get back after it. It's your future, my man.

Thank you for the feedback. My GPA is 3.2 and I need at least a 3.5 before even being accepted to the business school. I have about 10 credit hours to achieve this.

The feedback I've been given is that my algebra is weak. Which is funny because when I observed the pre calc class I found the material too easy but I didn't observe the entire semester.

Study real hard. They're not teaching you anything so complicated that you can't master it if you put enough time in (generally-speaking, I understand there are exceptions).

Math courses can be rough on beginning students. They are usually 5 unit courses and often they are not easy on top of that. Getting bad grades in those courses initially often makes it hard to get your GPA back up.

Take some of your General Ed courses. You need to have them anyway and they are usually easier to get good grades in. That will help get your GPA back up.

Perhaps you can ask around to find out a good math professor at your school. Someone who teaches well but is not unfair.

How about a tutor or joining a study group?

As Kurch pointed out - find out who are the "good" instructors (if that means easy at this point, so be it...). And, study groups are also good - even if only among you and your friends.

Irvine said:

Thank you for the feedback. My GPA is 3.2 and I need at least a 3.5 before even being accepted to the business school. I have about 10 credit hours to achieve this.

The feedback I've been given is that my algebra is weak. Which is funny because when I observed the pre calc class I found the material too easy but I didn't observe the entire semester.

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I kid you not, as soon I read your OP I thought to myself it could be an algebra issue. Did you receive that feedback from a professor or TA? I'd take that feedback to heart and try to work on the algebra as well as find a good study group as Desdemona suggested.

kurchatovium said:

Perhaps you can ask around to find out a good math professor at your school. Someone who teaches well but is not unfair.

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^This is really good general advice, although it may be too late for your calculus class. There are often huge differences in how students rate different professors teaching the same class and word gets around. If you're not naturally extroverted, you may need to be a little more outgoing and figure out which professors to avoid and find a good study group.

And if you're partying too much cut back for a semester. Duh. Good luck to you!

I recently retired after 40 years of teaching mathematics in college. My experience with calculus courses are is this: There are two kinds of people who get A's in them.
(1) People born with talent in mathematics.
(2) People who do all of the homework problems in the book, not just the ones assigned, and ask about any of them that gave them trouble. This asking involves going to the professor's (or teaching assistant's) office hours since nobody has enough time in class to answer all of them.

Good luck!

I failed calc my freshman year, and I'm not even at a tough school. So, if nothing else, don't feel too bad about how you're doing right now

I think that any person, anyone at all, can pick up a skill if they put in the time. For me to understand calc, that time would have been hours a day... And I don't have that kind of discipline.

So, you know. If you want to get an A, you already know what you have to do (I mean, just look at all this good advice!). I'm just writing to promise you that, if your business school deal doesn't work out, it isn't the end of the world! There's more to life than your GPA. You can still be happy regardless

milagros317 said:

I recently retired after 40 years of teaching mathematics in college. My experience with calculus courses are is this: There are two kinds of people who get A's in them.
(1) People born with talent in mathematics.
(2) People who do all of the homework problems in the book, not just the ones assigned, and ask about any of them that gave them trouble. This asking involves going to the professor's (or teaching assistant's) office hours since nobody has enough time in class to answer all of them.

Good luck!

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To your point about the 1 group, I have always found interesting that some people have a natural gift for Math. When I was in undergrad (almost 30 years ago now) one of the few classes I did not make an A in was College Algebra, despite trying hard. Thankfully I chose a career path that does not require any math skills lol

Anyway, I think it is great you taught for 40 years. I have great respect for people who work in academia.

Irvine said:

I was accepted into a prestigious school and had a tough 1 st semester. In order to continue I need straight A scores. My main hang up was and is calculus. This is my road block. I'm not quite sure what I should do.

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Well, first things first, were you focused? Or were you wishywashy about in the college biz? I did a comm college and transferred to a university. The latter part was not as great as it could've been because A: I had the wrong idea about college on my own in my head and B: the parts I did right the first time were being crapped on and I was being forced to retake (and feeling wronged about it) things. That's one angle to college. Stop startling women or getting mindwhomped and get your head in the game of being there because someone's money is being bet on. Maybe you're not up for mathematical whizbang stuff. Nothing wrong with it. Think if it's really something you want to do all the time.

Another angle is that you might be going after a degree that the college might hold some real pride about letting students graduate in, and if they don't like you so much they'll basically screw with you until you change your major or flunk out or stop going. College really isn't one of those things that end; you can always get a basic degree and later on decide you want to chase something you're passionate about or that you think offers some better career opportunities (I did). It looks a lot better than Joe Schmoe who comes in to class saying "I don't like this fucking shit, I gotta do this fucking shit, how do I get my C and get the fuck outta here", especially now that I've been years out of school with a degree, taking classes generally for a good time. It provides a pretty good perspective.

Thanks for all the advice! I will think long and hard about it but I postponed this semester as I didn't want to rush in. But I truly do thank you all for sharing your stories and advice.