Can She Do It? Should She Do It?

mix 'em up.

I would say do the more difficult ones first while your brain is still fresh, then if you have anything left towards the end yu can do the little ones to finish off. I have the utmost faith in you, you can do it! I sympathise as I am currently cramming for an exam next week which approx 1 1/2 weeks ago I wasn't gonna bother to sit. so as they say, 'i feel your pain!'

i'd suggest concentrating on the ones that will get you to an E first (another 23 points?), then see how much time you've got for the rest of it innit :)

I once due to a computer virus lost a semester's worth of work and had to reconstruct everythng in a week's time. I did it so I can attest to it being doable, but I got maybe 6 hours sleep total in that time.

First tackle whatever will make the most difefrence, then I'd suggest working on everything at the same time. That way you feel that progess is being made on all fronts and whenever you start to burn out on one paper you can switch to another. I found this the most effective method for me.

Good luck.

I have no advice, just wish to salute your heroic effort. Kick Ass!

If you'd done it properly all the work would have been completed in three hours at four in the morning anyway, so yes She can do and She will do it.

Good luck, Laura! My approach would be (if none of the pieces seem to go logically before any others) to aim at the biggest first, but also to schedule them, and try to hit a seventh of the total work (say 12 points worth) every day, or even to beat that so that a bit of relaxation time could be worked in.

Yeah, shoot for the D first, then go on. No shame in a C...

Mix 'em up.... don't do the littli ones first, otherwise you will spend half of your time on one pissy little paper that's worth hardly any points.

best of luck!

RE: your situation

I still (been out of college for quite a while) have this nightmare about twice a month.

good luck, i am sure you can closer to your a. maybe even all the way.

A bit late on the thread, but to add -- yes! Go for it. :-)

As a two-year college professor who has heard lots of excuses, even for incompletes, I would tackle the assignments worth the most points as well as personally ask the instructor for another week extension, using whatever reason(s) you wish to concoct. I always respond much less harshly to a student that takes the time to visit me in person rather than phone or email...I just like the human touch, I guess.

I think you should share the work out, and we'll all do one paper each for you :)

Go for it, Ms Laura!

Best of luck, Laura. We know you can do it!

Thank you, all of you. I kept coming back to read these postings for the last few days, when I thought about pulling my hair out and screaming (well, I did scream a bit) and all of that. I appreciate all of your words of encouragement *smile*

So, here's the update - I have finished all of the assignments that I can (the prof is emailing me the final essay questions) for the course, except for one final "Wrap-Up" paper that she's limited to three pages, and I'll write that one in the morning. And then I shall print all of the files and place them into a large envelope with a letter explaining all of the contents, and drop it off at the department office.

What a relief!

However, and here's the ugly part - I have decided that the fact that I have been able to complete all of the reading and all of the assignments for a graduate-level course in less than a week shows that, really, I have pretty much gotten all of the knowledge that I can from this program and that I need to be looking at other institutions to finish my MA - this was the fourth time that I have had this specific professor (as an undergrad and as a graduate) and it was the fourth time that I had seen the same assignments. I think I've exhausted what they have to offer, until they get some new faculty and/or new courses incorporated into the program.

Anyway, now I am thinking about where I want to go next and what I want to study that's new and exciting - all good things, overall, I do believe.

Erick - I particularly appreciated your insights as a prof - I've taught a few courses at the university level myself, but have never been the type of student I'd want to have in my own class, I must admit. I am fortunate that I have a good relationship with the professor for this course, having teamed with her on two projects outside of the University. But I also didn't want to take advantage of that friendship to get a grade in this course - I kind of feel as though since I paid for the darn thing I'd best get my money out of it, and, really, even if new skills aren't being learned, repetition is not always a bad thing - certainly these assignments were more polished than those I'd submitted for previous semesters to the prof.

Anyway, I just wanted to let y'all know where things stand - I am going to be sleeping for the next few days (my doctor is threatening to put my in the hospital if I don't get back to a regular sleep schedule!) but I am back around and functional - and I missed you all! Thank you, again.

That's weird I was thinking about this earlier this morning, basically wondering how you were getting on, so I was gonna revive the thread, but hey, you did it for me! All I can say is well done you for managing to complete all of the work. I think there's alot of truth in that you may have exhausted what the uni has to offer. Move onwards & upwards. YAY for ms laura!

*smile* Thank you very much, Pinkpanther - it is onwards and upwards that I shall go (after I collapse, downwards, into my bed for a while).

congratulations!! now if you've finished that final paper, get some much-deserved sleep

Sleep shall occur as soon as I return from purchasing dog food and rat food and tortoise food (they're all doing the "we're starving, unloved, and completely pathetic" act) and treats, 'cause I'm low on everything (and out of tortoise food - but she doesn't notice, really).

do you get special tortoise food? I thought they just ate lettuce and stuff

I missed this thread the first time but hurrah for you ms laura!

*laughing* She's a spoiled, moody little twit - she goes on self-induced starvation diets if her mixed dark greens are not mixed with an adequate enough amount of red-leaf lettuce, with chopped tomatoes and a (reptile) protien powder with calcium (because she doesn't like to eat foods that are good for her that are high in calcium and instead likes foods that are high in phosphates which are not good for her). Anyway, I am always buying different reptile food treats in the hopes of getting her to eat a more varied and balanced diet. Right now she has some shell deformities because of malnutrition as a hatchling - too late to correct for that, but I can try to keep things from getting worse.

Thank you very much, teeny *smile*

Y'now, when you said you've "never been the type of student I'd want to have in my own class," I laughed out loud, as I've actually told my students that same thing. I've always felt hypocritical telling the masses to study hard and start their written work weeks before the due dates, 'cause I slid through many a class ignoring that advice. And really, the only time that bit me in the ass was on my master's thesis in psych, so there were never any consequences that made me change. I recently started a MA in Humanities, and I didn't put the effort into my first class -- U.S. History to 1875 -- that I should have, yet I should do well in the class. Bad habits are hard to break, unless you find something so cool and fun that you're galvanized to read without any prodding. I hope you find that area.

Erick - I started off on the wrong foot in my collegiate (sp?) life, unfortunately - first class was American History, Colonization to Reformation. And we had one major paper for the course - had to read some historical book, relative to the time, and write a five to seven page report (MLA format and all of that crap, too). So it was the night before the paper was due and I hadn't read my "selected" book (Journals of Lewis and Clark) - so I made it up - all of it - I wrote about people not even on the expedition and assigned them most excellent quotes - created wonderful adventures and great losses (a notebook filled with Native American folklore of healing plants that was lost while fording some rapids on the return trip, etc.). And, well, I got an "A" on the thing - and the teacher was very impressed and wrote stuff like "I didn't know that!" and "What a great loss!" and so forth all over the darn thing. Kind of gave me a "hell, I'm smarter than they are!" attitude that I have spent the rest of my illustrious university career trying to keep stifled (stiffled?).

And, well, those times that I've actually completed assignments way ahead of time (doing that whole "responsible student" thing) I've not been impressed with the results.

Actually, I get so frustrated with grading in the humanities, anyway. One semester I was taking American and British Lit courses at the same time, and both courses covered T.S. Eliot. So I decided to write one paper and submit it in both classes - received an "A" in one and that professor asked to keep it to show to future classes and received a "B" in the other course, where the professor actually critiqued the darn thing and let me rewrite it to bring up my grade - I learned from the latter experience, got a swollen head and even worse of an attitude from the first.

I think my most difficult situation with higher education is that I have yet to find the field that not only interests me but challenges me - I have a high GPA, but that's not reflective of what I have learned in this program, as an undergrad and as a grad - I'd have a much lower GPA, and have learned a lot more, if I was in a program that was pushing me to actually stretch my limits - I know that one is supposed to do that on their own (that whole "you get from it what you put into it" axiom) but I don't seem to have the motivation in that way for technical communication. I am gravitating toward history, again, and also geology - the former would be easy to lose myself in, the latter would be challenging and I'd get to hike all over the hills, which would be quite wonderful.

I'm done, I'm done, I'm DONE!!!!

Yes - last paper just completed and proofread and printed to PDF - now all I have to do is print everything, type a letter, and stick everything into a REALLY big manilla envelope and drop it off.

Woo-hoo! My GPA will not be sucked down after all (at least in theory it won't).

Now it's time for glorious, lovely bed - not that I didn't spend a lot of the day sleeping and thinking about what books I am going to read next which is why I just now finished the darn paper. Yes! Life is good!

(And I feel like a good person, 'cause I just caught a few little bugs and went and threw them into the web of the spider who's moved into a corner of my bathtub, so she's settled as far as food is concerned for a few days - and my rat just ran through here in her ball - now I can go sit on the floor in my bathroom with her and we can play the lovely game of "I just covered both of my hands with lotion, so now is NOT a good time for me to chase the rat around the floor, crawling on my knees and elbows, 'cause my hands are all gloppy, attempting to snatch back my emory board(s)/lotion bottle/bookmark/kleenex/etc." that she is so fond of at this late hour.)

In a word, rah. :-)

this is pathetic. you couldn't of figured this shit out yourself...

Again, well done Ms Laura! :-) Now sleeeeeeep!

well done!

Well done, Laura - we knew you could do it! And now you can spend all of your time on ILX!

*laughing* Thank you ever so much for that suggestion, Martin - I shall be spending a wee bit more time here, of course (after going through rather nasty withdrawls for the past week or so I realize now just how addicted I am to this community!).

And I slept and slept and slept last night - so now I feel like a new (and much nicer) person. My plans for the day? To sleep it away. Exciting life that I'm leading, eh?