My mandatory research/study project (which was on Hypertension, its effects on the local community, and some research into the new methods of managing it, for the record) was deemed a success when I presented it today. It gets included in our college lesson plan for being the best project submitted, and this also adds a huge chunk of credit to my assessment. Praise Krong! The biggest hurdle is cleared. Now all that's left is good old-fashioned bog-standard work. Discuss: School projects that you remember.
I remember stacking bricks and corporal punishment mostly from my schooling. But then I dropped out in sixth grade and educated myself from there on.
Does a normal lecture about computer architecture in computers of various ages and makings that was digressed by the lecturer himself and devolved into a free-for-all talk about modifying the Commodore Datasette to force it to operate on turbo speed count for the purpose of this thread? Because if it does not, then there was also that one time when, to get a passing grade on Operating Systems, me and my friend (we operated in two-person teams for this assignment) made a portable system to measure mobile phone signal, and made it look like a miniature satellite (sort of like a red Sputnik 1 on steroids). And there was also that one time when we got an assignment on Digital Electronics, and me and my other friend made a dummy bomb (there was nothing that could explode inside, but other than that it was fully functional) that could also function as a clock with alarm, depending on how you set the master switch. And it even "exploded" when there was 1 second left on the timer, just because.
Natural sciences / computer science high school program where I enrolled in '97. DOS and windows 3.11 classes... the computer programing class was in super pascal. http://www.robaquatics.com/facepalm.jpg Note that all other school computers except those in the DOS/win 3.11 classrooms were Win NT 4.0 or Win 95.
I dare you to try an assembly language. Or Brainfuck. Pascal is pretty bad, but it's still not the lowest it can get.
Assembly is my preferred language. It allows the most absolute control. Your PC can die terribly due to one single typo. (That is not to imply that I understand much of it. I just understand what the languages have to offer.)
It's been a long time since I've been in school, but here are some of my most memorable assignments: 1. Had to give an oral presentation to a cross-disciplinary class: Earth History (essentially). It included about a half-dozen professors (Geochemistry/Geophysics/Geobiology/Biology) which is about 5 too many. I gave a talk about Ocean Salinity. About 2 minutes into it, the biology professor interrupted me to, essentially, attack something that I was saying, and then the geochemistry professor came to my defense. The discussion was as far from civil as it could possibly get. I don't think I ever regained the little composure that I started with after that and it was probably the most nerve-wracking experience of my life. It's hard enough for me to talk in public, all of what was happening simply unnerved me. BTW, none of the other professors, all with the Geology department, could stand the Biology professor (who actually was a visiting professor from Scripps, and somewhat famous disciple of James Lovelock, the Gaia guy). Oh yea, and she was completely clueless and completely bonkers in so many ways. I switched majors from Geophysics shortly thereafter. 2. High School Physics, we had to build a bridge using supplied materials and the bridge had to meet certain weight/length restrictions. The materials included two small blocks of wood, some elmers glue, and 4 thumbtacks. Our grade was supposed to be proportional to how much weight the bridge would take before it collapsed. Now this was the first AP physics class that the professor had taught (he had only previously taught honors and regents classes). He was going to judge us based on previous year's average. I was the second or third person selected to have their bridge tested. I was so proud of what I had made -- I spent hours designing it and building it. It didn't look that impressive. But I broke all previous records, so I knew that I had earned an A. Unfortunately, the teacher decided that he needed to know just how much weight the bridge would hold. I begged him to stop putting weights on,but he kept on going... Until suddenly, like a spring, pieces of my bridge shot all across the classroom in an explosion. I was pissed off. (BTW, my record did not hold -- at least 3 or 4 other people in the same class equalled or exceeded my record -- I think mine was the only one that when it collapsed, it did so explosively), 3. Back to college, another oral presentation. All engineers in my school were required to take a public speaking class. We had to give 3(?) talks, one would be technical, one would be technical with visual aids, and one would be non-technical. On my non-technical talk I decided to speak about science fiction. Well much to my surprise, after I gave the talk, the professor admitted to the class that he was a science fiction writer on the side (I hadn't heard of him before then). I think he was thrilled that there was someone in the class who shared his interests and opinions. I have more memories but that's enough for now.
Amen. There are those who naturally care for others. And there are those who do not. Nothing wrong with being a bit disinclined to ruin a perfectly good day of being lazy by helping a stranger. But I do wish the world was a bit more inclined to bother to care. How many people with sound health never donate blood? How many people learn they are dying of inoperable cancer and refuse to donate their organs despite Doctors telling them that although they are doomed, a half-dozen others could live decades with their sacrifice? How many see a critical accident and walk past because they cannot be bothered to check and see if the victims are alright? If I had one wish for the world, it would be that each Human cares for others as much as for themselves. But I am way off topic here. So excuse me while I slap my mouth shut with a hammer.
There was one time where we were doing an in-class lab thing about static electricity, where we made two chains of three people. We then had each chain do something or other to build their static charge, then touch each other. I was on the far end of the chain from the point of contact, and I made the mistake of saying out loud something to the effect of "Oh hey, I didn't feel hardly anything, I guess the farther you are from the shock the less you feel". The teacher overheard me, and decided that what I meant was "the farther you are from whatever is generating the charge the less you feel". She then revealed that she had a freaking electrostatic generator in the classroom, and was going to have the entire class link arms, have one end of the chain touch the coil, and the other end touch a grounded metal sink. And I was volunteered to be the ground-toucher because of what I never said. I couldn't feel my arm for three hours after that. She wasn't even the worst teacher I ever had.
My personal favorite was in a physics class where we kept heckling our lecturer for getting shit wrong and he let us teach the class... and most people learnt more in that lesson than the rest of the course on that topic (iirc it was something dumb like uniform circular motion in the context of satellites or something).
The problem with US public schools is, if you read all of the Magic School Bus books you've pretty much learned everything the schools teach you except for math and literature and maybe geography for at least six, possibly up to nine grade levels. And also half of the remaining three grade levels. And all of the entry-level college courses. The problem with Americans is, about one in five thousand ever read those books.
Amusingly this is in Australia where we do have some standards . Edit: And yeah, I know some guys in the US who were homeschooled and could set end of year exams by a quarter of the way through the year.
This x1000. Most American kids don't bother much with shcool stuff (typo intended), preferring to have fun and mess around as a rule. Problem is, graduates from school and college are having increasing trouble getting decent employment. Some people, regardless of straight A's all throughout school and A-levels/honor courses throughout college, lack what it takes for the job at hand, especially in the corporate and medicine sectors. Anyone can memorize an entire goddamn textbook but jobs demand APPLICATION of what you've learned. This malaise is one of the reasons why people don't trust doctors as much as they used to. The simple reason being there's a large gap between known skills of this generation compared to the previous one. To digress, let me cite the example of my own batch in college. 150 of us began the course 5 years ago. 75 of us are left as interns. And I can cite only about 20-30 of these who will make good, COMPETENT medical professionals once their internship is finished. The rest are lazy bums who got this far by scraping through the course, and have no aptitude whatsoever for medicine. The sad part is, anyone with a few brains, plenty of push, and a willingness to work hard can actually succeed as professional physicians/surgeons.
As an Insulin Dependant Diabetic I have come to learn that most Doctors are idiots. (I mean that literally.) They preach "Tight Control" as an absolute. And they have no idea how to actually manage Diabetes. If I took the amount of Insulin my Doctors of the past told me to take I would be dead by now. The fact is that some changes may be warranted, but not an absolutely perfect system of taking "Exactly" enough Insulin. That leads to unavoidable hypoglycemia and can easily lead to death. But the average Doctor cannot learn this lesson. I have found in recent years the best way to find a competent Doctor is to simply tell them I absolutely will not do everything they say to the letter. And I tell them that I would rather minimize hypoglycemia than maintain nearly perfect blood glucose all the time. If they essentially panic and say I must then I tell them to go 'Eff themselves and switch Doctors the same day. But while a competent Doctor may be puzzled by my behavior, he or she will accept it and try to provide the best assistance they can that I will accept. Learn this lesson yourself Warlock. Not all solutions are acceptable. And most of your colleges are unable to understand this at all. Let reason and a level head be your guide. Welcome to the flock of sheeple. You cannot make them independent or intelligent, but you can find a place that is better than they can find. My Hemoglobin A1C is ~8% right now. Too high I know. But I honestly fear hypoglycemia more than the consequences of my lack of tight control. Far more... I think the best solution to the school problem is to start accepting some failures. That forces those who remain to worry when they are not trying to learn. Right now we as a society in America cannot accept that some people are simply unwilling to learn and succeed. This policy needs to die in a fire.
I am very pleased with your opinion, as a whole, about how people in my profession should behave. IMHO, my peers and contemporaries need to understand that compliance cannot be 100%, and a reasonable amount of leeway must be given to the patient to make their own decisions. Unfortunately, consent forms don't even serve their purpose when treatments are administered - the doctor usually tries to influence the patient for or against a certain kind of treatment, thus making "informed consent" invalid. I try to be patient-centric in my dealings, but as an intern I must still follow hospital policy to a certain extent. Unfortunate, but partly necessary. You cannot learn real medicine from books. It is something many people do not understand. Practice and experience have NO SUBSTITUTES. TL;DR: If you don't work, you don't learn anything, and by analogy, the dumber you are. what is this, I don't even........ Don't they know that dosages have to be carefully regulated? Algorithms for management only go so far. Before you hurt someone, you have to consult a doctor who actually knows what they are doing, ask what you're doing wrong or what could go wrong, and then refer the patient to said expert. As for your HbA1c, It gives a *general* idea of your current diabetic status, NO MORE. Random blood sugar samples are the better option for long-term management. Changes that take place in a diabetic person's body can happen sooner or later, the progression varies largely between patients. While that doesn't mean they can consume all the sugar, fats, and calories they want, that doesn't mean they need to stick to a totally strict regimen. That kind of control regimen is for people who pulled back from a DKA crisis. The problem here is that they haven't tried to update themselves, I should think. The current word among the actually competent focuses mainly on preventing a hypoglycemic crisis.
I have been taking several injections daily for more than two decades now. I know it sounds arrogant, but I think I have a better understanding of my situation that 90% of Endocrinologists. (And much better than most Doctors.) What I know is that nothing can be more dangerous than hypoglycemia. It induces a state that the average person would be just as likely to see as a drunken stupor or drug abuse than a medical condition. I have never woke up in the drunk tank at the local Police department. But that is purely by sheer luck. If I were out more frequently I think that would not be the case. If I saw someone that looks like myself acting like a drunk, and I were a Policeman, they may wake up in the drunk tank with a bloody nose for their trouble. Sad but true. In the last five years I have been hospitalized several times while suffering hypoglycemia purely because the police thought I was drugged and refused to accept my poorly chosen words. (My memory is not clear on what exactly I said, but they told me I was incoherent and they would never have believed I was clean of drugs without a Doctor reading the lab report to them.) By the time they took the blood for the test the hypoglycemia had passed. So no-one really knew what to think of the whole situation. I am way off topic. So I will end it here. Remember what you wrote above Warlock. You will make a very good Doctor.
The problem is slightly more complicated than that. First off, I was told repeatedly during high school that I had "plenty of time" to figure out what I wanted to do as a career. I made the mistake of believing this. As a result, when I left high school, I still had no idea what I wanted to pursue, so I tried waiting a year before I went to college. My parents, for some ungodly reason, told me I still had "plenty of time" so other than a single temporary job that ended up falling through after a laughably short time, I mostly ended up just sitting around reading and playing video games, occasionally trying a few things like writing or programming to see if I had any special aptitude/passion for them. I should note that at this point I realized I was most likely depressed, and had been ever since around the middle of high school, but couldn't see a doctor about it or anything because lol, economy. Once the year was over, I enrolled in a community college as an undecided major, because I was told that I could decide what I wanted to do there, and had, you guessed it, "plenty of time". Fast forward a year: I still have no idea what I want to do, my "undecided" major's nearly done because as it turns out all of those AP courses my parents badgered me into taking took half the time that I thought I'd have to decide on something off of my degree, and my GPA is bad enough that I'm on the warning list for government grant funding. And to top it all off, it turns out that it doesn't even actually matter what degree you get, because you won't end up doing anything related to it anyway and will invariably have to start off waiting tables, if you're lucky. As of now I've been in a small apartment in the middle of nowhere for a few months, had a grand total of two temporary jobs that lasted at most a month, and although I've mostly figured out what I want to do (write things), I'm terrified I'm not going to get into a position where I'm able to do that before I get kicked onto the streets.
