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Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Grades 

The moment of truth.

I knew I scored a 4.0 in Fitness Lab. It's based entirely on how many hours you log in the quarter and I worked my ass off to get that 4.0. I was excited to know I would be getting a 4.0 (even if it was just in gym) because it's the first in my college career. And almost my first ever. LOL I can only remember getting two 4.0 grades before. One in Ceramics in high school and the other in a summer school construction class through Tritek (though at the time it wasn't called that).

The truth is I never really cared about grades. At all. I always did well enough to pass without putting forth much effort. I enjoyed some classes so much, while never bothering to do the homework, that I probably learned more than anyone in the class but got a C because I never did the assignments.

Now I have a reason to care. A big reason. I have goals and an agenda. On the one hand I need good grades to continue getting financial aid. Plus I need to improve my G.P.A. to get into the program I want at U.W. in a year. When I went back to school my G.P.A. was a 2.7. Surprisingly higher than I expected. But no where near where it needs to be to get into the BioEngineering program.

I knew I was doing pretty well in math too. Thanks to my amazingly wonderful math teacher Nick Criddle!! I consistently scored in the 89%-98% range on my tests. I knew I was going to do better in that class than I had ever done in an academic class. It all came down to the final really. The final turned out to be harder than I expected. I felt pretty comfortable with it though. I figured I could pull off a pretty decent 3.6 maybe 3.7 in math. I didn't dare hope for anything higher.

History, of course, would be my downfall. I really enjoyed my history class. In the beginning it was hella interesting. Slowly it got boring. Not the class, just the material. I got sick and missed a few days and really from there on I felt like I was floundering. I got a 79% on my midterm. Which is alarmingly low and yet significantly higher than the class average. We had to write a paper based on a chapter in the supplemental book. The paper wasn't my best work. I wouldn't have given myself better than a C on it. Imagine my surprise when I got it back with a B+!! I think that grade and the pep talk from my teacher inspired me anew. I felt like I really wanted to do well in this class. I studied pretty hard for the final. Something else I've never really done before. I don't know how I did on the final. But I felt good about it overall. I figured in light of my feelings about the final and the fact that I got between 80 and 90 percent on all of my quizzes I would be pretty happy to get a 3.2 or so. I worried that it might drop below a 3.0 because of the midterm.

The last day of class was the 20th. And then there was a long grueling wait because grades didn't come out until the 27th. By the time the 27th rolled around I had forgotten to be worried about my grades until my mom mentioned that my sister had gotten hers. I called my sister and she told me how to check my grades online. I tried it but the online KIOSK was closed. this doesn't make sense. Why bother having a person-less computer system so people can conveniently check their status online and then only make it usable during business hours??

So today was the day I could check them. And I did it first thing this morning. I was incredibly shocked by my THREE 4.0's!! Somehow, God only knows how, I managed to get a 4.0 on not only Gym but Math and History as well! I'm still very much in shock. I keep checking the website to make sure they haven't somehow discovered their clerical mistake and changed it to a more reasonable grade. I will be sad when they do.

It's an amazing feeling to do this well. Granted its some kind of fluke, but still. It feels very validating. I'm trying not to let it go to my head. Luckily my sister put me in my place. I emailed her immediately to show her what I got and she emailed me back telling me that I need to take real classes (above 200 level) and THEN see how I do. I can always count on her to put things in perspective.

But for now I'm still giddy and on cloud nine. My mom said she was going to ask my dad to pay me $50 for each of my A's. LOL Something they never got to do for me in high school. I think the fact that they forked over $900+ to get me in school should be enough. LOL

Shawn is very proud of me as well. he said he knew I should have gone to school back when he went for 2 quarters. LOL isn't timing interesting?

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Friday, March 02, 2007

Here I Come. 

So it appears I'm moving to Seattle. Not today. Not this year even but come fall 2008 I will likely (hopefully) be a Seattlite.

This is happy news. About 10 years too late! But happy news.

Here's why. WSU (in Pullman) offers Bioengineering. They are the ones who turned me onto it in the first place. But on closer inspection of their class structure it became clear that they expect you to start as a freshman. In fact they seem to make it nearly impossible to transfer there as an upperclassman and get a degree in Bioengineering. They do this by having a single required bioengineering class that you have to take all four years. I almost cried!

But turns out UW offers the same degree without this weirdness. Yes, at UW I can transfer in as a Junior and finish my degree two years later. :) Happy, happy, joy, joy!

So that's the plan. Classes this quarter, classes this summer, classes all next year and then I'm off to Seattle! I will actually be able to finish my AA this year. That's my goal. But then there are several pre-recs that I think would be easier to take here.

I'm really excited about moving to Seattle. I've always wanted to. And it seems I know more people there than here in the TC's anyway!

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