Grades

I think the hardest part of any class is waiting on a grade. Some classes you know right away where you are, but with a class involving a paper there is a bit of anxiety. I kind of like having a right and wrong answer, but I tend to do better when it's subjunctive. (I think that is the word I want!)

I'll find out on Monday, I think, how I did on my Java midterm, all full credit on all assignments so far. I have a project and a final in that class so even if I didn't ace the midterm I have room to make things up. I can program I just don't take multiple choice test referring to said program well. My C++ class I literally failed the one test we had, got a 52, but I got an A in the class because not only did I get full credit on every assignment, I did all of the extra credit available. I knew that going into the test though, maybe if it had mattered I would have tried harder. Moot point now, got the A.

Monday (I think, I'll have to check) begins Biology 100. I think I'm good there. I'm glad I"m taking these courses first, getting myself back into the university thing, getting used to managing my time and studying etc before I get into the 'meat' of my major. That and A's to pad the gpa are always welcome. They don't count to my Major GPA, which is the important one, but it still looks good.

It's in

Final paper in, I'll post it later

Final Paper Candidate

Final Paper Candidate

I feel good about it, my only concerns are flow and if I annotated the bibliography sufficiently.

It's due by midnight Sat night but I"d like to have it in by tomorrow at the latest.

It's in Microsoft Word 2003 format if anyone want to download it and let me know what they think.

I'll post the final final one when I turn it in.

Java Midterm

Done, I won't get a grade until the deadline expires, but I looked just about everything up that I wasn't sure about. It should be good.

This professor got rude and condescending with a student again. I sent her an email telling her I'm right behind her if she complains, I can't believe this guy. She's all rattled thinking she did something horribly wrong, and she just told him that if she has a question it's because she doesn't know the answer. I can't WAIT to fill out my end of class survey.

His excuse for berating her was that even though he hadn't changed the sylabus yet, we were supposed to take what he says in a discussion thread OVER the syllabus. While teachers are allowed to change the syllabus they are supposed to actually change it and not berate people for being confused because the teacher hasn't actually done what he said he was going to do yet.

I am so not pleased, I'm going to dig up the email for the dean, which he keeps daring us to do, and start the official complaint process. I'm not paying a lot for this class (community college ftw) but I am still paying and that means I deserve some respect and cooperation from the teacher.

Here is something wrong with Higher Education, when you treat people like children they tend to act that way. Treat them like adults and, while yes I know not all of them, but many will rise to the occasion.

note: sent an email to the dean and the girl that was all flustered was happy I did so, we'll see what, if anything happens

Power Point Done

You can download it from Power Point Thing if you so desire, but it's in.

Now just polish the paper and annotate the bibliography. Oh and take my Java midterm but that isn't posted until tomorrow.

Power Point

Either I did something very much wrong or that was way easier than I thought.

I clicked, I typed, I put in cheesy clip art, I made stupid transitions and told it to play... I guess I could narrate it but I really don't think my professor cares that much.

I'm going to go read all of the discussion on the class board about this in case I missed something vital.

I am not creative!!!!!

Working on this power point silliness, I've got the text (mostly) done for the slides but now I need to make it interesting to look at. I really want full credit so I'm willing to put the effort in, but I am so not creative. I make people less creative by being in the room with them!!

Here goes nothing...

Learning to Read...

Here is the requirement for this paper

Length: 1200-1600 words (approximately 6-8 pages, double-spaced, excluding charts, graphs, citation page, title page, etc.).

In my head I read that as 12 to 16 pages and I had been in a panic trying to figure out how to extend the paper. I am at 10 pages with 2.6 k words with a bit more to add. I wrote five without even using sources.

Time to take a hatchet and cut this down a bit, but I am suddenly a LOT less stressed about the final paper. I"m glad I went back and checked.

Less stressed about the power point thing, I found my Office install disks, at least I have the program now.

I love professors that keep us up to date on where we are in the class. The final total is 800 points, because of quizes and the research proposal (didn't get full credit) I'm down 23 points. The cut from A to A- is 761 so if I'm perfect with the rest I've nailed it, but I have 16 points to play with.

However this isn't my strongest suite so while as always I will shoot for an A, an A- is still a pretty significant accomplishment.

I can't even begin to describe the amount of stress that has just lifted off of my shoulders, the paper is almost done just need to add a few graphs and a screenshot, then polish and annotate the bibliography.

Now that Java midterm... we'll see how that goes.

OMG

Battlestar Galatica ended it's third season just like the other two.... I love this show.

Full Credit!

Got full credit on the rough draft! I like how this professor is making different assignments count so much (final paper is only 200, rough draft was 150) so I have a chance of padding my grade. Doing something stupid on the final paper doesn't guarantee failing the class, but then again acing the final paper doesn't guarantee getting an A.

The point of the class is to teach us how to research and I think these assignments cover that pretty well.

This week is going to be beyond nuts, Power Point presentation is due Wed, final paper due by Sat and I have my Java midterm somewhere in there also. May not be leaving the house much, but this is why I'm doing this!

Rough Draft Done!

Despite all of the distractions of the past few days, the rough draft is done! It's longer than the requirement for the rough draft but not even close to how long it's supposed to be for the final paper. I need more things to say! =)

You can download it from Rough Draft paper! if you so desire, it's in Microsoft Word 2003 (Windows) format.

Huge relief to get at least that in. Now I wait for feedback from the professor, inflict it on a few cousins and try to figure out how to do a power point presentation without actually having power point. I'm going to have to ding up my Office disks I guess.

However I think I may take tonight off, perhaps tomorrow too, depending on how quickly the professor gets back to me on the paper. I'd work on Java but I've got nothing to do there... go figure.

Maybe I really can do this school thing =)

Java Update

Sometimes I forget that I have another class. Got full credit on the assignment, getting less than full credit would have been embarrassing.

The midterm is next week so I'm going to attempt to get my paper pretty much written by Tuesday so I have a little breathing room to make sure I do well on the Java test. He gave us a few more guidelines so I have something to study.

Reading this man's posts and his correspondence that has been posted he's really rude. He seems to be the kind of teacher that thinks he is so much better than his students, which really bothers me. He doesn't answer questions really, and he's sarcastic but not in a good or funny way, it is more in a belittling way.

I had some suspicions before the class began. There is an option for the instructor to post the sylabus and book requirements before the first day of class. My last class did this, and it gave me some lead time to get the book, which I appreciated. It also gave me a good idea what I was walking into and let me schedule accordingly.

This guy didn't put anything up.

I have an end of course survey I get to fill out, and I'm sure I can find other places to post my concerns, facebook comes to mind. I love that the net allows such information to be available to anyone who thinks to look.

I did look before I took this class but no information was available about this instructor, hopefully I can fix that.

Flow of sentence structure

I'm having a sort of conversation with another student about sentence structure, this other student is advocating short simple sentences while my tendency is to make them so long they tend to be run on.

I posted a body paragraph of my rough draft, as was the assignment, for critique. He was absolutely correct with one of them but I don't agree with the others. Here they are:

My sentence

However this box does not contain the entirety of the game, the install disk only has the client, or half of the information needed to run the game.


The student's response:

(You have two independent ideas separated by commas. They should be separated by periods or semicolon.)

I'm not completely happy with the sentence but I don't think it should be two separate sentences.

What do you think?

First rough draft half done

Thanks to cuzzie who helped me go over it a bit, first half, maybe third, of the paper's rough draft is finished, well as finished as a rough draft can be.

In our class we were asked to post our intro paragraph. So far the one I read wasn't so good, and I tried to make constructive critizm, thinks like put your topic in the intro, list out what you're going to talk about, don't put in obscure throw away references without giving them at least a little bit of contex, all things I was taught in school. The guy basically told me he was right and I was wrong, which I really don't care about, but I had said cuzzie look at it and she not only agreed with me but took it a step further.

Then this guy starts giving advice to others about making their sentences shorter and more direct. See spot run. Good dog spot. omg give me a break, do they not teach people the basics of writing anymore? I'm guessing he didn't read the book or he would know how stupid he sounds.

Made me feel better though =) too bad it was at someone else's expense but hey, he was so blatantly wrong. I'm not going to post the example because it was put on a private board available only to people in the class, just trust me on this.

Easy part of the paper is pretty much done, now for the part that isn't from my own knowledge and has to address a specific question. I also have got to make sure I put the interdisciplinary slant in or that will cost me points, no matter how good my paper is.

House update, the ants are driving me batty, half a bottle of RAID and scrubbing up the stove doesn't seem to be helping much. I can't figure out where they're coming in, so foul.

Outline Done

Finally, now I just have to put my research together to get it to say what I want it to. My professor has been fantastic with advice, links and getting back to me quickly.

Now I do the reading of stuff and getting quotes, putting them into the outline and then start writing. Once I get started it shouldn't take too long, and the professor is all over the 'going over the rough draft and giving feedback' so the sooner I get it to him the better.

Oh, and when the Columbia Law Review cites a blog I start to get worried. I'll rant about that later.

I think it's all put together, in my head at least

Going to do the 'final' outline and begin on the rough draft today. I think I've got everything sorted out in my head, now the hard part is putting it all together in a coherent format.

I'll link things as I get them done, any and all feedback is welcome!

Here goes nothing...

Got my paper topic

I went out to lunch today with my old boss, mostly to just catch up, ok really just to catch up. But since I was there I made sure I could use him as a source for my paper, since I can't use myself as a source. He and I talked about many things MMO related, the state if his current game, future ideas, how things should change, basically 'industry talk' stuff. Was nice, I miss that.

After we got back I got to meet their PR lady, who I had heard about often but had never met. She and I ended up talking for about four hours about a million things, but during this epic conversation she ended up mentioning that she was directly involved with EQ2's Station Exchange.

This is something I am looking to reference, so he volunteered any information and quotes I needed. After these conversations I've decided to narrow my topic a bit more.

Massive Multiplayer Online Games have to deal with people buying and selling their virtual items for non-virtual money, a black market of sorts. This is done on eBay and other third party sites and is not sanctioned by the game companies, and thus not policed. Sony Online, with EQ2 decided to take a different approach and set up something called the Station Exchange. This allows people to buy and sell the RIGHTS (this is very important) to these in game items through a safe and controlled environment provided by the company. This is a great departure from Sony's policy in the past. I am going to examine this program and discuss if it was successful, what, if any, impact it has had on the number of players of EQ2 and what Sony plans to do in the future.

The best part is that they published their results for the first year, so most of my research is done for me. I can spend the first part of the paper explaining exactly what a MMO is, and then lead into EQ2 specifically. To fufill my interdisciplinary requirement I'll look at it from an economic point of view, mostly how much money SOE has made.

The best part is the Executive Producer of EQ2 is a close friend, so I can pick his brain for some cool quotes.

So despite my not really doing anything for class today, I actually accomplished something pretty significant!

Lets hear it for useless assignments!

More on this Java class

So we finally get a new assignment. I have a bunch of work on my research paper to do this week so I was a bit apprehensive, worried about time management and all. I go to look at the assignment and it was 'correct the following code' with four conditional statements.

For anyone who doesn't know programming it was basically 'fix these spelling errors' and all of the words are listed not quite in alphabetical order in the chapter, oh and you learned them a month ago and if you didn't know them you would have failed the last assignment.

He really wasn't kidding either, we waited a week to get a 'know where the semi colons go' five min assignment. I took an extra ten mins to triple check as I couldn't believe it was really that easy, but it was!

I get my next assignment on the 26th and the midterm on the 28th. So far no hint on what is on the midterm. If his assignments have any bearing on the midterm it's going to take 1o mins total, but I am honestly afraid it's going to be generated from a test bank that goes with the book so he will have basically not prepared us at all for the test.

This isn't supposed to be an independent study course, but he's treating it like one. I can't imagine if I had to actually sit through a lecture from this guy, I might throw something at him, or even worse fall asleep. This is why I'm doing my classes online, so the stupid useless teachers aren't wasting more of my time than is necessary. I can't WAIT for the end of semester review I get to do.

This Java class is the kind of class I would just stop attending, get the assignments from a buddy and hand them in whenever he decides they're due. By doing it online I don't have that option so it means I pay a bit more attention than I would have in a 'traditional classroom setting'. I'd probably get kicked out of the class for asking too many questions =)

In better news my University professor got back to me in under 10 mins and is optimistic about the direction I'm going with my paper. Here is someone who is not wasting my time with useless busywork. He has the whole semester listed out, with all of the expectations, readings and requirements spelled out and due dates listed. The only thing that can't be done ahead of time is the discussion threads, but that works for me as the topics apply to the research we are doing and it keeps us focused.

Inflexible Professors just make life more difficult

I understand that teaching a class isn't trivial, it's not an easy thing to keep track of where each student is even with all of the tools available. What I don't get is teachers (this one isn't a Professor) who are so inflexible about something that doesn't cost him anything but would make the student's lives so much easier.

I am referring to my Java class. This class is through the local community college, mostly because it's less expensive and helps me get ahead on my degree. It isn't a month only class, it lasts for a full semester, because of this there really isn't the intensity that I feel for my research paper class.

I am taking Java online also, the community college uses an environment that seems to work, WebCT for anyone that is familiar with this stuff. My issue here is that we know how many assignments will be needed, even when they are due, but we don't know what they are until the teacher posts them. It's his choices in posting that is giving me fits.

He has a timeline for his class, more power to him for that, but he only posts the next assignment x amount of days before it is due (it's not consistent) and not right after the last assignment is due. Because of this we had a whole week with nothing to work on, in which I could have gotten ahead a bit. Instead I get the assignment now, so instead of doing it last week when I had more time, this week turns into a bigger stress than it needed to be.

To make it even more frustrating he's been asked repeatedly to post the assignments early and he refuses to, and his excuse is 'the class was set up before day one and he's not changing things' (lame but ok he's got an ego) but the best one was 'he has to keep things even for everyone' which makes NO sense and I called him on.

He suggested we do assignments at the end of the chapters in the down time. I told him I'm not going to do that, I don't have the time or motivation to work on random problems, I want the one that I am going to be responsible for. If he wants us to do extra problems then give me credit for them, otherwise it's not going to happen.

I'm not being lazy, that is how class things work. I am not going to spend hours working on problems for my own edification when I have no avenue to ask questions or get assistance, because if he can't give us the assignments that we are going to get credit for, I am sure he's not going to take the time to help me if I get stuck on something he didn't assign. And if he would then why the hell doesn't he just let me work on the problem he thinks is necessary??

If he offered extra credit for other problems being done that would be one thing, but a basic introduction to Java class is not something I am going to spend extra time on for no return.

I even understand why he wouldn't want people turning in assignments early, trying to grade things like that would be a nightmare, but letting us know what the assignments are going to be doesn't hurt anyone and actually helps us who are trying to budget our time.

I am trying to take every class I take seriously, so I can get the most out of them, getting my 'money's worth' so to speak. This guy is really helping me push Java to the back burner. Oh did I mention he posts his version of the answer to the assignment and has stated it's ok if people just copy it? It's not like it's something similar so we can see how that kind of code works, it's the exact problem. I just don't get it, really.

So this week I not only have to have all of my research done for my paper, an 'annotated bibliography' finished (new to me but it makes sense) but I now have to resist the temptation to just put my name on this guy's program and actually learn the Java he's pretending to teach.

And people wonder why their employees don't know shit, it's teachers like this that encourage laziness and lack of organizational skills.

Student Loans

Student Loans... the fact of life for pretty much everyone, and now I"m no different.

There is no way I'm eligable for anything need based so I apply for the unsubsidized Stafford Loans, which they grant. With taking one class a month I really don't want to have to work. I get the amount and it's barely enough to cover tuition. I have tuition covered but how do they expect anyone to be able to go to school if they only barely cover tuition? There is also an upper limit, so if you go to a high tuition school you're screwed by the end. It's not going to be enough for me to live, even doing the 'starving student' thing, so I look for other options.

What I found was 'Alternative Loans', offered by the same bank that is backing my Stafford Loans, but it's income and credit based, and apparently the fact I own my house doesn't count for anything and I need a co-signer. I'm going to hit up my mother later, but how is a student going to have the debt to income ratio to qualify for these loans?

Not even taking into consideration the amount of debt that is acquired by the end of a normal Bachelor's degree this stuff is insane. It is basically forcing people to work while going to school, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but it does limit how much time they have for classwork and lengthens the time they will take to finish, they can't take as many classes because they're working their asses off to just be able to eat!

I don't think I could hold down a full time job and do well in school, not in the program I'm taking at least. Maybe someone with better time organization skills than I have could do it, but there just aren't enough hours in the day!

I may be able to pull off part time work, but that means no benefits and a crappy job. We'll see how this loan thing comes out, I'd rather get this huge amount of debt and work things out at the other end.

My plan is to get the max I am eligible for and stick it in savings, taking out what I need each month. Then I'll see what I have left at the end of the year and adjust accordingly. The ONLY reason I'm considering these loans is that I only have to pay interest until six months after I graduate so it's more manageable than a home equity loan. I will NOT live off of credit cards, that is just the path of ruin.

Libraries!

Today I had a list of books I needed so I went to the National University Library. My cell phone pic above shows the front, I figured I'd document it and all.

The librarian was very helpful and pointed me in the correct direction, I found most of my books without a problem, though the mechanizaed stacks were kind of entertaining. I moved them the first time and realized I really should have checked to see if anyone was on the other side, but since no screams of pain ensued I figured I was alright.

The thing that again, made me feel old, but excited me a bit were the little things. Last time I was in school you had to fight to find the few cubes that had power cords, usually you were on the floor in a corner because that was the only outlet. Today not only does every station have power, but there are multiple outlets at every table, and the Librarian said they're all wi-fied. I would have KILLED for that, being able to work on programs and such at the library instead of the noisy computer lab or my apartment, that would have been wonderful.

It's a bit easier now to work from home, being that I own the place and all, but still it's nice to know I have options.

I now have books, journal articles, and have completely run out of time today if I'm going to make my susi/movie date, so tomorrow is big homework day. I was trying to avoid having to do schoolwork on weekends but that may be unrealistic.

Zodiac tonight, I hope the movie is as good as I've heard =)

Thesis statements and you

This has always been my biggest hurdle when writing a paper, getting the topic narrow and detailed enough. Once this is done I'm good to go, outline flows, paper pretty much writes itself (assuming I have the research I need) and I"m good to go, but this is like a mental block and I get nervous.

This paper has to have an interdisciplinary slant but still relate to my major. I worked in the video game industry for a few years and pretty much everyone I know in San Diego (that I didn't know before I moved down here) still does. Because of this I decided to write about the issue of buying and selling virtual items for non-virtual currency, being referred to in 'the industry' as RMT (Real Money Transactions). I am going to illustrate three different attitudes the companies can take and those effects on their games success and popularity, and then touch on the legal aspects. It's putting that into words I'm having trouble with.

A thesis can be a whole paragraph right, not just the sentence at the end of the first paragraph? Is it ok to say 'this researcher will be looking', is that pretentious? I know the first person isn't acceptable, I do remember that much from that English class 16 years ago (this is where I put in the omg I'm old speech. I'm too lazy to type it out again so just interject your own, it's more entertaining that way).

This is my goal today, to have this first paragraph(s) worked out so I have a direction. I'll post more when I have it done. I'm actually going down to the college library today to get some books, how quaint!

First class March 2008 - ILR 260

Information Literacy and Report Writing

The goal of this class seems to be to teach me how to write a research paper. I'm good with this as it's been decades (you're going to see me through that word around a lot here) since I last wrote a paper. I last did research in a musty library using the dewy decimal system.

So today I started researching things related to virtual commerce happening in real life in Massive Multiplayer Online Games. Basically when people exchange real money for pixels in a game, and those pixels are really owned by someone else. Yes this happens, and yes it is a silly as it sounds.

My teacher didn't like my research proposal so I'm waiting on his feedback to continue, but while I"m waiting I started looking for sources. It's all online now! Ok most of it is, but still, much less time looking through stacks trying to find that volume that has that specific journal article in it.

I have a list of books to get tomorrow from the NU library, I have three journal articles talking about the economics of MMO's already, I"m sure I'll be able to find more if I try. That is already more sources than this assignment requires, I just now need to hammer out a real thesis.

My big suprise today however was the bibliography organization program I ran across. If I use this thing to cite sources it will build my whole bibliography for me, I am honestly amazed. No more points taken off of a perfectly good paper because I messed up some format with a reference!

Tomorrow consists of reworking the thesis and getting more sources. Hopefully also hammering out a working outline, I'd like to plan this so I've got at least one day on the weekends where I"m not doing school work, especially writing a paper that is important.

Going back to school

I've just started my first class in the official 'going back to school' phase of my life, and I kept thinking as time went on that I need to blog this.

Let me start with some background, to put all of this in context. I'm 34, single, no kids, living in San Diego. I have two dogs and a cat and a couple of roommates, but I own my own place. I went to college right out of high school, two of them actually, and just couldn't do it due to health reasons.

I've worked different jobs over the years, spent time unemployed and not worried about it, but I'm finally at the point where I want a career. I thought I had one a few years ago but it ended up being a dead end thing. That and corporate politics just pissed me off enough that I left.

I finally got my Associates Degree last August (yeah!) and decided it was time to bite the bullet and get that degree that actually means something when looking for a 'real job'. I realized that I need to have real sellable skills to get the kind of job I want, so here I am.

I am enrolled at National University in the online Computer Science program, though their setup is a bit different. They do one class a month, just that one class, but you wrap a whole semester in a month, so far it's been a little intense. Of course it's been about a week, but still.

I chose to go online because it seems to work with my personal internal schedule better. I am very much not a morning person and being able to log in whenever during the day seems to elicit better grades and more learning from me. That along with the one class a month things, eliminating my short attention span issues, I am feeling very confident about this program all around.

This blog will be documenting this return to school, my amazement at the new advances in pretty much everything academic, and if nothing else a place for me to vent about schoolwork.