That's why I've been pitching in time and helping Drs at my university with their research in fields like RF and Physics. I learn much more then anything I've gotten out of a classroom.
> Taking only 5 math courses (3 calc + discrete + linear?) is likely woefully inadequate, unless they're all taught very well or you plan to teach yourself a bunch more math
When I'm taking on a problem that needs to be solved I immerse myself with information about the problem domain.
Linear algebra is the only thing that you've talked about at all that I've found useful so far. I did a bit of game development in my own time in high school and ended up teaching myself a lot about it. Mainly I just dicked around with implementing parts of a physics engine and taught myself a lot. So yes, the reason I want to go into R&D is because I like to learn about many different things but only if there is a reason.
But still, I don't want to be the only person in a team in R&D. I want to write firmware, software, and work on implementing designs. I've also proven to be fairly "ok" so far at management. I've got a lot to learn but it is something I can do, so I might bark up that tree.
> The humanities courses are a good place to practice your writing and argumentation; those skills are transferable to negotiation of every sort.
I do more writing and argumentation in my own time. I spend about 10 to 15 minutes
> Also, you could've knocked a bunch of those required courses with AP/IB credits in high school (2 history courses, 1 or 2 english, intro bio/chem/phys (3), intro CS (1), calc (1-2) = 7-10 courses).
If these are things that could have been "knocked" out in high school then they definitely shouldn't be part of a high school curriculum. I had a lot of family problems in high school and that lead to a large problem with my "behavior" in school. Mainly not wanting to take shit from my teachers after hearing everything all night from my parents. Here are some antidotes from my high school "experience" (which I also consider to be mostly useless and feel a majority of the time I spent there could have been better spent someplace I could have actually learned something rather then just sit and stair at a wall all day)
- My math teacher told me that any problems that I didn't show work on would result in a 0. This was after the game-dev time in my life and the class was only algebra 2. Everything was easy and I didn't show any work. I just took the zeros on the homeworks/exams until I was called into the guidance office to "explain' myself. I said for them to give harder problems or for them to leave me alone.
- My math teacher didn't like me using pen on the exam. She said I'd loose 5 points every time if I did. I just kept doing it. I think my highest grade from that marking period was a 95.
- I gained access to the schools camera/DVR system and used it to find my friends between class. Principle threatens to call the cops and I just gave them all the info I had and told them I was sorry.
- I didn't do any of the homework or classwork for my English class one semester, scored AP on all the standardized exams and 80+ on all the class work. They put me into a remedial class for English where I put in the same amount of effort but ended up getting an A.
- I managed to get a D in gym class some how. I don't even remember how that happened.
- Pre-Calc my senior year I again didn't do anything except now we where allowed TI NSpire's so I ended up installing Pokemon on my calculator. I played that.
- My last two years I was able to take programming classes, I helped the teachers clean up their material since they where teaching from books. Nothing good ever comes from that.
Anything that carries over from that shit show into academia is again a huge hint that you've got a large problem. I also don't think my time should be wasted learning things I don't need nor do I want to pay for it.
I'd understand if most people actually remembered the materials taught in these classes. That's one thing. But that is seldom the case.
There are very limited things that college has been good for:
- I've got a lot of debt which makes me now applicable to some government loans/small business programs.
- I've met 1 or 2 professors who are actually good at what they do AND want to share their secret sauce
- I have access to a library with academic subscriptions (although the library won't subscribe to JOM... bastards. I pay them 15k/year they can spend a bit of that on important reading material)
- I can help people build things that I like