Tuesday, November 17th 2009

I am questioning the very fiber of my being at this point. Actually, just what is the point? I don’t know anything. I’m insufficient, like the funds in my bank account.

I’m failing everything. Everything. This is not even an exaggeration. My highest grade right now is a D+ in the class that I expected to have an A in. Computer Modeling II, which I busted my ass for and caught up in just in time for midterms? Failure. My compensation and overcompensation for my “decision” to get an infection and then come down with the flu were apparently not worth my time, since, work or not, I did in fact get sick. And that, in and of itself, is grounds for failure. Obviously. Because I also have an F in Intro to 3D Animation, despite, again, over-hauling and overcompensating for my absences, even struggling through in-class exercises that I came to find out were useless to do, since the points were eternally lost when I DECIDED to be infected/ill. Even in Designing Interior Spaces and Worlds, which has been nothing but hurdles for me. Another F. Because I started the class in Week 2 instead of Week 1, had to miss half of Week 2’s class because that was when my lovely staph infection decided to explode in my mouth, and had to osmose the knowledge of how to digitally paint in Photoshop. And I don’t care what Word says, osmose IS a word, a verb, in fact, derived from the word OSMOSIS, so FUCK YOU MICROSOFT. I had to miss midterm week in that class, which is I guess why I have an F in that class – she didn’t have much to put in without my midterm assignment to consider. I’m hoping that’s the case, at least.

After contacting Ellen about my failing, she told me the best I can manage is a C. With complete perfection for the rest of the quarter. Funny how strokes of bad luck can take perfection and make it into something just barely acceptable, hmm? I mean, imagine Jesus. The perfect man, supposedly. Now, imagine if we all went, “Oh, dude. No way. You didn’t pay your taxes? Fuck, man, you’re no savior of mine. Guess you’re right down here on my level, now.” Of course, this requires a certain degree of Christianity, or religious tolerance, whatever. Point being: if the work is done, and done well (or beyond well), then why can’t credit be given where it’s due? Why can’t great work earn a great grade? Why can’t extra effort get a little extra attention? Even if there’s something that came up, that messed the original plans up, isn’t that life? And isn’t recovering from it part of life? Why, then, is said recovery treated so inconsiderately, or even neglected entirely? Are we really trying to teach this generation not to bother with making up your work, since it yields no pay-off? This is America. We are a consumer nation, dreaming of the dollar and driven by the promise of a paycheck. If we can’t even count on our determination, hard work, and overcompensation to get us the grade we deserve in our classes, then what level of idiocy do they think we have that we wouldn’t apply that same interpretation to the work place in our future and rule out that extra attention, compensation, and hard work would benefit us at all in our career? If teachers can’t acknowledge that students are human, and that life happens, what can we expect in the real world, that imaginary place after graduation? Will we be expected to never get sick and work every day of the rest of our lives?

What am I even working towards? I feel like everything I learn in school now is something I should have taught myself, because it’s all just projects using knowledge that we’re expected to already have. I’ve noticed a severe decline in passion and sympathy in the teachers. If you don’t know it, they often don’t care and won’t go out of their way to remedy it. Even though it’s their job. I keep finding things irrelevant to my interests, and whenever I find something that actually contains relevance, its time consuming and therefore I’m unable to explore it, because my time has to go to these projects that I completely suck at because I apparently can’t learn whatever it is that is getting “taught” in my classes.

I feel like a monkey. I go to class, and I don’t get taught anything other than a series of imitations. My role isn’t to be creative, or seek understanding, but just to accept and do as shown, as told, as instructed, even if I don’t know what it is I’m actually seeing, or hearing, or doing. The foundation of my learning process is knowing WHY. Understanding HOW. And these are the two aspects of my education that have been left hollow and void for the past year. I am not told HOW this program functions. I do not know WHY these vertices are not connected. I don’t know WHAT these modifiers do, nor do I understand WHY they seem to have no affect on my model.

Occasionally, I’m TOLD to buy a book. This book is often irrelevant. Not once have I found a book that I have had even a passing interest to look at after a class was over. Program guides would be helpful. Appealing and helpful. An explanation of Unreal would be appealing, helpful, and far too relevant to ever expect seeing on any of my course syllabi. Actual, coherent, meaningful tutorials on TOOLS, not techniques, in various programs would be SUPERB. It’s all very well that you can make an image like that with just the brush tool, but what exactly is the brush tool? What settings does it have? What are custom brushes? HOW did you make that image with just the brush tool? What settings did you use?

This is shit that should be answered, explained, understood – but no.

Monkey see, monkey do,
let me show this trick to you.

The why and how are mine to know
So ha ha ha fuck you.

I’m so tired of going to school to “learn” shit, and all I’m getting is grief over not ALREADY knowing things. How can one be expected to know something if it is not taught? Just because I’m not three doesn’t mean I don’t still function on the same basic human learning premises. If not taught, it is not learned. If a child is not taught manners, they do not learn manners except by way of faulty interpretation through punishment. Similarly, I am not being taught these programs, and am instead learning through a terribly incomplete method of, in a way, running through them blindfolded until I DON’T hit a wall. It is painful, time-consuming, and largely ineffective towards the accomplishment of my assigned tasks.

Or maybe it’s just me. Maybe I’m the only one suffering from this. I apparently am. No one else is seeing this as a hard thing. It isn’t an issue that the why and how are missing. It isn’t an issue that they get sick. Maybe I’m just too mortal. Too flawed. I’m penalized because this condition is unique unto me, and therefore isn’t something to be recompensed, since no one else is afflicted by it.

I don’t even want to get started on anything else that’s been bothering me. If I just typed two solid pages on how unhappy I am with school, can you imagine how terrifyingly monstrous something more personal might get?

Yep, I just broke your mind.