Re: [DL] Rpg classes

["Nick Zachariasen" <zacharin@pluto.dsu.edu>]

> My first advice is not to narrowly define what you want to major in before
> you get to school.  I've seen a lot of unhappy students who are majoring
in
> what they think they should rather than what they enjoy.  This is a bad
> approach for two reasons:
>
> 1) If you are going to invest 4 years (give or take) in a field of study,
> you should find it personally rewarding and fulfilling.

Give.  Trust me, give.  Personally, I'm going to be giving until it hurts.

> 2) Your success at college/university will be measured by your GPA.  If
you
> hate what you are doing, you will be less likely to approach the work with
> interest or passion.  That will result in doing less well than if you
> enjoyed what you were doing.

Hear, hear.  I used to be a Computer Science major until I failed College
Algebra.  I realized there was no way in Hell I was going to make it in that
program without MAYBE taking that class over again at least twice, so I went
with what I was good at rather than where the Brando-sized paycheck would
be.

> Next, you need to change your approach to the question.  Instead of asking
> yourself what you want to spend the rest of your life doing and get a
degree
> in that, ask yourself what skills are needed to perform that job.  Then
get
> them.

See above.  I wanted to work in a computer-related field, but I wouldn't
have been able to hack the math of Comp-Sci, so I went with English for
Information Systems, which trains you for A) technical writing and B) being
a web monkey.  I've grown very accustomed to the web-monkeyness, and have in
fact begun to enjoy it a great deal.

> Memorize the rules of English.  If you haven't done so before, diagram
some
> sentences.  This will give you the discipline -- because writing is a
> discipline.

As stupid as it seems at the time, diagramming sentences really does teach
you about the various parts of the English language- just make sure you have
lots of room for complex sentences like "The child ran into the street to
get a ball" <joking grin> (seriously, though, it can take a lot of room).
Also make sure you have your "there/their/they're", "your/you're/yore"
(yeah, the last one's a stretch, but it's possible!), and "its/it's"
straight.  Also make sure you NEVER pluralize using an apostrophe (to the
PEG guys, your new webmaster is doing this with "Marshal's" [sic] and
"Posse's" [also sic] in the Library section), even with an abbreviation like
"CD".  That irritates the Hell out of me.  Of course, I'm told mine is a
rather radical approach to the apostrophe pluralization by the man who is
both my adacemic advisor and the advisor to the paper that I'm the Editor
of.

> LEARN TO PROOFREAD!  I can't stress this one enough.  While everyone makes
> mistakes, your profs will not think highly of your work if you do not give
> them the sense that making sure your paper is clean of simple errors
(giving
> them the time to work on style and logic).  If you give the impression
such
> a process isn't worth your time, they will wonder why looking at your
paper
> any longer than it takes to mark an F upon it is worth theirs.

This is another good point (and Brian, if I have a typo somewhere in here,
this is a discussion on education, not a Master's thesis on Chaucer-
besides, I caught you twice in the last month).  The same teacher mentioned
above says that some of the worst writers he sees are English majors.  This
may be because they think they know how to write rather than some musclehead
who writes in crayon, knows he can't write worth a tinker's cuss, but tries
to plod along anyway simply because he has to.  I've seen people who were
supposed to be either English majors (people who should DEFINITELY know
grammar and spelling) or Education majors (people who should bloody well
know it because they're going to be TEACHERS, for Shaft's sake...) who
couldn't consruct a good paragraph to save their lives.  Before I was the
Editor of the paper, I was a proofreader (some bump up, huh?).  I liked to
think of myself as "The Butcher".

Anyway, that was my 4 cents on the matter (4 simply because I have a
tendency to not shut up), and I better get to bed now.

Nick "Don't start, kiwi!" Zachariasen

"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro."
Hunter S. Thompson