mandolin | Can't believe I'm saying this, but...

Seriously - if your first class of grad school, a double-numbered class at that, reduces you to tears when you're less than halfway through the course, isn't that a good indicator that you're probably not cut out to tackle courses beyond that?

I can't rewrite a project proposal to pacify the members of my group in two days. I can't meet the technical expectations of at least one of our members. I can't even get one of the members to respond to any of my e-mails. I can't get a decisive answer out of my professor to save my life. I can't seem to wrangle a freaking thesis paragraph after half an hour of trying to work things out with another group member's help.

And I'm supposed to be in CHARGE.

Yeah.

Not exactly inspiring leadership. Not even coherent leadership, come to think of it.

If this is an indicator of things to come, I'm seriously considering trying my damnedest to somehow get a good paper grade this semester (just for my group members) and then getting out for my health.

I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm starting to think that grad school was a bad idea.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

*hugs* Okay feel free to discard this info but sometimes being the one in charge means saying you've had a chance to voice your opinion and you haven't so here is the choice I made.

I am in leadership of a spiritual group and sometimes its like hearding cats. Somethings we have come up with is the like hearding cats thing, e-mail is not an effective means of communication and when all else fails you are the one in charge so make the decision if the group cries foul well remind them you tried to get thier input and they failed to respond. Chocolate is golden. Don't be afraid to crack the whip. If your instructor is not meeting expections remember you are paying for that class. :o)

Hope this helps,
Melrae

Working in groups can be an absolute horror, so I sympathize. Why schools, businesses, etc. have made group projects the standard whether the size of the project demands it or not is beyond me; often it just means time wasted in meetings, people who let the others carry all the weight, and so on.

That said, try not to let one experience ruin things for you; most teams won't be this bad and most teachers won't be unresponsive.

just big huge {{HUGS}}

And everyone's right. Group projects suck.

Partway through my second year of grad school, I realized that I hated it. My supervisor and I hated each other's guts, my experiments weren't working, and I was miserable and tired. I ended up depressive, apathetic, hating every day and dreading every morning because I knew I'd have to go back and face another day of it. I was convinced that I had thrown away my chances for medical school, that there was no way anything good would come of this, that my name would be blackened and that everything had gone to hell. Meanwhile, a friend of mine, at a different university, went through the same struggle. She quit grad school after a year; I stayed in and finished. She's moved on and is working in a new field, now, one that she loves very much. I've got a Masters degree framed on my parents' wall at home and I'm in my own dream career.

What's the moral of the story? Nothing, I suppose, save to say that if you truly are miserable, then getting out won't be the end of everything. Chalk it up to a learning experience and move on to the next part. Or stick it through, stay with it, and with luck and goodwill, you'll come through on the other side stronger for having done so.

But don't make the decision based on one class, or even one assignment from one class. So it isn't going well - that's okay. That happens sometimes. Maybe it'll work out in the end and maybe it won't. Either way, will you ahve learned anything that can help you in the future, with grad school or with anything else? That should be the marker of success. One project isn't necessarily a marker of things to come. It could just be a rotten project. It's not a popular view in our society, but occasionally doing badly on something is good for you. I learned more about myself through that bad experience of grad school than I did through sixteen years of coasting through school with nary an effort.

Not all the projects and professors will be like this. Many will be better. A few might be even worse. It's just part of the range of experience.

of course, it's entirely up to you, but it does sounds like you just have a bad class and a bad prof. probably because it is a double numbered class. that, and i've found the numbering on classes doesn't necessarily reflect how hard they are. or well taught. or well organized. hang in there. you can do it.

I'm here very randomly (really, something like friend of a friend of a friend or something...) but I did have a thought or two for you. I'm actually working on my second Masters degree, so I do know what you're feeling.

The first semester of grad school is always the worst. You're doing something new (sometimes in a new place even), you're scared you're going to fail and you're neighbor knocks on your door to ask how you are and suddenly you are literally crying on her shoulder in your doorway. Trust me. I've been there. (And at times I doubt I would have made it through that first semester without her.) And then a fellow grad student let me in on a little advice: it's always like that your first semester of grad school. Then you find out that you can survive and without getting those 'C' grades that you were scared of (so close to passing but still just missing it by grad school standards its practically worse than outright flunking) and the juggling of time isn't as bad as you thought it was and you find other people who started with you and you all get together to bitch about your advisers over margaritas. So, just hang in there, get through your first semester and you'll feel much better in the spring. :D

Can't believe I'm saying this, but...

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