Grad Students: Do you find classes difficult?

[Stiganator]

I've been really struggling with my classes this semester. It makes me feel like I'm not smart enough to be in grad school. Any other grad students feel like this?

I'm taking Optics, Mathematical Neuroscience, and Advance Instrumentation. Optics is the real killer though.

 

[halik]

I got all A+ except one B+ this semester... so no

<- Applied Economics MA - Finance

 

[venkman]

No.

MS Finance

So far, 1 A+, 3 A, and two pending one of which should be an A and other which will probably be an A-/B+ .

Depends on what you are going in, I hear the EE Masters programs can be BRUTAL.

 

[RKS]

I never really studied too hard in high school or undergrad but that wasn't the case when I went for my JD. I not only had to finally study but I was surrounded by intelligent and motivated students.


edit: For our base classes we were on a C curve and core subjects were on a B curve. Not many escaped with their ego intact. Out of a typical class of 50 we 'may' have had 2 or 3 As and about 15 Bs. There was even a mandatory allocation for Ds and lower.

I'm not sure if Masters programs are different from law school; but not everyone is expected to get As or Bs for all of their classes.

 

[uclaLabrat]

That's the point of grad school. They tear you down so they can build you back up again, the right way. They spend the first year giving you the firehose treatment and making you feel stupid. Then you learn.

 

[venkman]

Originally posted by: uclaLabrat
That's the point of grad school. They tear you down so they can build you back up again, the right way. They spend the first year giving you the firehose treatment and making you feel stupid. Then you learn.

Mine keeps the focus on teaching us USEFUL* stuff.

Note: About 10% of Undergrad is considered useful.

 

[Special K]

I found EE grad school to be very difficult. I went to a top program and there were many people in my classes who were much smarter than me. It was a humiliating experience.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

no. MS in CS. i think my undergrad program was harder, or rather, prepared me fairly well. 4.0gpa, probably went to 1/2 to 2/3 of classes. i did try to sign up for classes i was interested in, so that made it easier

 

[njmodi]

Yes - MS in EE with a focus on DSP and signal detection and estimation - the math (random variable theory) killed me... the word "eigenvalues" makes me shudder... I don't know how I survived - a LOT of smart people in grad school and yes, mostly all foreign students.... (at least in my field).

 

[StormRider]

Yes, grad level classes for me were much harder than undergrad. As an undergrad student, I would usually get solid or high A's in many classes but I struggled to get B's in many of my grad level classes. I was in the graduate EE and Applied Math programs.

 

[Chronoshock]

Doing an MEng in CS right now, went from MIT undergrad to MIT grad and I had taken grad classes in my senior year, so the transition wasn't too bad. Some classes were hard, some weren't, but overall I was used to it. For me, the biggest challenge has been staying focused with my research, and now working on my thesis.

 

[Stiganator]

That makes me feel a little bit better. I'm Biomedical Engineering and the problem is that undergrad is so broad that you touch all the basics of each traditional engineering field, but never get to master it. Now in grad school, the courses are assuming you are traditional ME or EE and learned the things, but that is not the case.

 

[BrownTown]

Originally posted by: Stiganator
That makes me feel a little bit better. I'm Biomedical Engineering and the problem is that undergrad is so broad that you touch all the basics of each traditional engineering field, but never get to master it. Now in grad school, the courses are assuming you are traditional ME or EE and learned the things, but that is not the case.

heh, thats my beef with BME, they try to make people be all things and really in the end you aren't great at anything. I always though it would make more sense for BME type projects you just hire 10 EEs, 10 MEs, 5 CS people, something like that with an intellegent distribution of labor. ALOT of the BME classes just seem to bbe ME or EE classes but with BME type problems. For example in EE we have image processing and in BME they have a similar course except all the images are of medical scans like Xrays and CAT scans etc.

Also from my understanding you pretty much NEED an advanced degree to get anywhere as a BME, that always seemed kind of annyoing. BTW I WAS BME\EE double major until I just dumped the BME half because it seemed like EE gives you like 100,000 different jobs to choose from and BME only adds like 1000 more, too specialised for an undergraduate degree.

 

[Capt Caveman]

Some yes, some no.

 

[bonkers325]

you will struggle if you dont work with your peers

its important for you to understand the material, but if u dont understand then u should find classmates and ask for help

 

[dandruff]

nope.

 

[halik]

Originally posted by: njmodi
Yes - MS in EE with a focus on DSP and signal detection and estimation - the math (random variable theory) killed me... the word "eigenvalues" makes me shudder... I don't know how I survived - a LOT of smart people in grad school and yes, mostly all foreign students.... (at least in my field).

Haha get yourself a ti89... you type in the matrix and it will give you the eigenvalues back

 

[clamum]

Originally posted by: HardcoreRobot
no. MS in CS. i think my undergrad program was harder, or rather, prepared me fairly well. 4.0gpa, probably went to 1/2 to 2/3 of classes. i did try to sign up for classes i was interested in, so that made it easier

I have a Bachlor's in CS and may one day get my Master's. I take it in grad school for CS you tend to focus on a more specific subject, like A.I. Neural Networks or something like Large-Scale Software Design? How do you go about choosing? What are you doing? Thanks for any info.

 

[QueHuong]

Consensus seems to be that business grad school is easy as pie, while engineering is difficult. See sig.

 

[Parasitic]

You need to look at things with a different mentality, especially if you are a PhD student. Classes should be secondary to your research.

 

[Stiganator]

True, but if you don't hack it with the B- grades, you'll get ejected from the program.

 

[HardcoreRobot]

Originally posted by: clamum

Originally posted by: HardcoreRobot
no. MS in CS. i think my undergrad program was harder, or rather, prepared me fairly well. 4.0gpa, probably went to 1/2 to 2/3 of classes. i did try to sign up for classes i was interested in, so that made it easier

I have a Bachlor's in CS and may one day get my Master's. I take it in grad school for CS you tend to focus on a more specific subject, like A.I. Neural Networks or something like Large-Scale Software Design? How do you go about choosing? What are you doing? Thanks for any info.

I think that mostly depends on the school. For my program, specialization was not required. There were 3 mandatory classes that were pre-reqs for everything else. They did have 'paths' for different subjects (ex. SW Engr, Databases, Security, AI, etc.). I ended up taking a couple DB classes, a couple networking classes, a couple database security classes and an undergrad Unix course. if you already have an established career that you like, it would make sense to focus on what you do for a living. Even though i went back to school while working (employer paid), I really didnt (and still dont) know what I wanted so I just sampled everything. I think there is some value to that approach as well as a very specific one. Again, it is very dependent on the school. Even at mine I could have taken less classes and done a dissertation, or less classes and done research. Neither of those fit well with my full time job so I didnt consider those approaches, but they were options.

A lot depends on your mentality - I went back because it was free, because I had free time at work I could use, and because I wanted it on my resume. As such, I went after the classes that interested me that did not seem to require obscene amounts of work. Lazy man approach. Others go back for research, or to get into the more complicated stuff. If I ever feel that urge, I will grab my Phd...

 

[hypn0tik]

Yes.

EE grad in EM theory.

 

[AmpedSilence]

No.

MS in Bioinformatics.

The lab work was cake, but the programming was slightly less mind numbing.

 

[WildHorse]

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