CONTINUATION ---> RANT 4
10/13/17
Hi, going to rant about a class I'm taking right now and the school system. FEEL MY RAW EMOTION:
I feel like some teachers have disappointed me to the point where I feel school just is not for me because teachers exist. The bad ones, I mean.
My Molecular Biology teacher has ATTITUDE where she says stuff like "This is big kid time; you guys need to sign the roll or you're tardy" when NOT EVERYONE received the roll, and even the people who was in class on time did not receive the roll, so why the heck are you demeaning us on something we did not do? Or we ask her a question about a test question we got back, and she says "This is a 4000 level course. You figure out that question and answer on your own." And you didn't think I already went through the textbooks, notes, and Internet, and attempted? Like WTF woman, you think we all stand here, expecting you to do the wok? If that was the case, we would have asked for ALL the questions, but we asked for ONE. So this was a problem we had DESPITE using the resources, and we just. need. this. question. answered. cause. you. wrote. the. confusing. question. SO EXPLAIN YOURSELF? She would not even let someone go to their best friend's wedding (the wedding had to be rescheduled because Hurricane Irma destroyed the initial wedding area). The girl had to sit there in class, listening to Dr. Jenson fuggin swatting makeshift flies while never finishing a sentence and teaching like she had one thought and putting 6 million more thoughts in there, instead of being her best friend's maid of honor. And Dr. Jenson will ALWAYS put in the random comment "You're big kids now. So you're going to have to do this work for yourselves." While lecturing. She just randomly tells the silent audience to do THEIR job as students, and she can keep teaching badly.
So if they have a question, you're on your own. Not my fault.Then, I told myself "Fugh it, I am just going to study hard for this quiz coming up because Quest Con is coming and another exam, and I need to get this out of the way. If I complain too much but do not put in the work, who am I to complain?" Well, 118 slides in, and those 10 questions on the quiz were bonkers, man (I took it yesterday). It made me upset that she once said "Yeah, I test you on the slides. Nothing else. I hate it when teachers tell you one thing and give you another" And then proceeds to say "You need to look for outside information to get everything" JUST TO CLARIFY why a question had a completely foreign answer to us.
Like for example, she teaches us that -10 box is TATAAT. And -35 box is TTGACA. That is it. That's what the lecture was on. On the quiz, worth 10 points, is the question "What is the Pribnow box sequence?" ....Like, what? I was not taught that box. So I chose anything OTHER than the sequences I knew, because I have not heard of "pribnow" before. Turns out pribnow box is -10 box = TATAAT box, and I woke up this morning just fuming: WHY THE FUGH DID I STUDY FOR 8 FUGGIN HOURS FOR THIS TEST TO MISS A QUESTION ON SOMETHING I ALREADY KNEW? There was something so messed up about this system. WHEN DID SHE SAY "PRIBNOW" IN CLASS? IF SHE SAID IT BEFORE, I MISSED IT. THAT IS IF SHE EVEN SAID IT, OR ASSUMED WE ALREADY KNEW ITS ALTERNATIVE NAME. This would have been nothing, if not for the future thought:
How many more of these questions is she going to throw our way? If she can do this on a quiz, can't she do this on the cumulative final? Just how much control as a student can I make? I can study hard, but in the end, the teacher can screw you over if they are bad enough. I despise being put in a situation where your success is detrimented by someone else's, no matter what you do. It goes against my idea of happiness, virtue, courtesy, and sanity. But isn't school always like this?
Well, school made sense before. Working hard for teachers like this MAKES NO SENSE.
And you may think "It's just a question on a quiz. How does that determine how successful you will be in future endeavors?"The small moments in life can give you hints on the bigger picture. If school has these teachers, than has the school system done something wrong? I think so. Of course, Florida's school system, and specifically my university's science department needs a lot of work. And I put that into account. I will not accept being a victim of bad teaching nonetheless. I will not get used to it. So yes. This teacher does not stop teaching after I am done with the course. They will keep teaching like this to other students, and to other students, and to other students. I can do teacher evaluations, that chairs would accumulate (if they care) to finally give "a word" to the professor. But that is after they have already screwed over so many students with this system.
I have talked to her after class, I have talked to her through email. I remind her she has made mathematical grading errors for the whole class. She is like "Oops, thanks for the heads up" and then does not change it. I do not know why people seem so competent only TO NOT COMMUNICATE A TOPIC CORRECTLY. Now, I am calculating if I can get a C with this type of "learning", and I usually shoot for As. Is this my fault as a student? Absolutely not. This is the fault of the teacher.
Also, I was a Physics TA a year ago for an Indian Physics professor, who was there for only a year. The Physics department put so many classes and work on for the first year that she went through so much anxiety (she would call me up at 9 PM and ask if her and I can talk at the mall, and I say "The mall is closed." And she says "Well, can we talk in the parking lot?" And if I drive there, it is her having a breakdown. Then she asked for last minute help from me after finals week was over because her grading Physics TA decided to wait until the last few HOURS to get all of the grades in. It was crazy, it was chaotic, this was no condusive to success, and the material she had to teach was 2x the amount a regular students was supposed to take. They put 2 Physics courses into 1 and expected a professor to work with that. And she was a GOOD teacher who cared, so of course she broke. She left to India without a word from the school or me over the Summer, and never came back. The Physics department is in shambles with bad professors and a high failing rate, only curtailed by 20+ points of curving, which hides the bad teaching test averages and keeps their jobs. The university noticed and has since moved the Physics department under the control of the Chemistry department.....
THE FUGGIN CHEMISTRY DEPARTMENT. I have had experience with them. I tutor chemistry for them too. Chemistry professors there are really bad as well (unless you have the rare good professor, and they do not stay long either). If Chemistry cannot keep itself up, how would they keep up Physics, with the way they treat their teachers and failing students?
Recently, my own tutoring center has the audacity to call me into the office and say "Carmen, the office specialist, noticed that you were agreeing with the Physics student that their professor was teaching the subject wrong. Well, as tutors, we are here to help. Not to affirm their frustrations."
And I say "But the reason they are there for tutoring, since I have been there, is to see if anyone has taken the same course has them, been through the same frustrating circumstances, and know what problems they are going through."
And she says "We are only here to help. Not get too heated in a discussion."
And I say "The student was explaining that they do not know where to start with notes because the Physics professor PROVIDED no notes. Only clicker questions that the student is not allowed to have and take pictures of, and none of that material is actually on the test. The Physics teachers here do NOT lecture. I know all of them. They have heavy tenure. Plenty of them have been on probation for years for failing more than 60% of their students every semester. These students come to me with obvious concerns I cannot ignore. Carmen may have thought the tutoring session sounded overly negative and grim, because the situation with Physics IS very grim. We have to be realistic, or else we cannot start anywhere with Physics tutoring."
Then she says "The next time you have a student that starts off the conversation complaining about her/his professor, you just smile and say nothing."
And I say "That sounds a little robotic and precievingly judgmental. Every Physics student that comes to Physics tutoring starts off with a complaint because they ARE going up against the tide. if I cannot acknowledge that first and then work on ways to go around it and then teach Physics blindly, I know that student will fail, like plenty of other students that just "work hard" but do not know how to work with these types of professors. I am not helping them to succeed, just blindly go forward."
When students work hard and get low grades, do not tell them to work harder. There is a lesson to be learned here, and it is not for them.No realism always was the most blissful way to succeed.
I think instead of faulting students, you are allowed to look at the impact of the teacher you hire in as a university and school system, instead of always pointing the blame at someone else. Maybe redoing the way teaching is being done and structured in America is a better way to tackle "student problems" than telling the student to "spend less time with your kid and use colored flashcards" so they can tackle the over-testing, commonly anti-social, and not down to Earth unrealistic learning obstacles you put on them.Anyways. There's my rant.
Inktober Binge Livestream on 10/28/17 at 6 PM CST. Be there, and finish Inktober pictures with me. Also, I won 3rd place ($125) for Innovation Celebration competition at the College of Business. I pitched Life Plot, a business ideas where you plant a tree on top of a dead body to get nature walks instead of cemeteries. I am really connecting more to business students and faculty (they DO things. They make things HAPPEN, whether they have to start a business to make it happen or not) than I am to anyone my age as of late. But I do not want to get a full-time job to get closer to "career folk". That is drawling and boring. Stuck in a tight bind of decisions. Someone talk to me later to help me contemplate life.
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6/30/17
If you were a refugee, poor, fleeing a country that you know more than anyone is too dangerous, and you risked everything: your finances, health, and safety for your children to be away from the violence, but you are weak, broken, lied to about which refugee camp you will go to, how long you will stay, whose fault it is, how you will survive, how you can support them through all of this - You would be a candidate for ISIS too. Someone speaks of an "initiative to give you food for your family and fight for your people instead of sitting there hoping hoping hoping for something better".
If they told you that the enemy are the people who have HELPED cause the very militaristic gun violence and political chaos in your country to begin with, you would be desperate too. Imagine being in their shoes. They walked so many miles just to not get bombed on by the very few percentages of people you are afraid of. You would put a blanket of "OUT" over an entire population as long as you got the "one cockroach". THAT is what terrorism does, and that is what you would be doing if you follow that logic.
Imagine being told those people helped start it and are maintaining that violence while pointing to poor people like you saying
"It is their faults". But you still try to reach the border, believing that despite, you will get safety and freedom in that other country.
Then that country constructs a ban on you, keeping you out, not for your education (whether you are a doctor or not), for your service, or how many children- but your LOCATION, WHICH CONNECTS GREATLY TO YOUR CULTURE, AND USUALLY RELIGION.
THAT is what makes people lose hope, and go towards ISIS and become Sleeper Cells. If we generalize those who want to get away from that violence as those who "could", you will have more and more broken candidates for ISIS than now.
Although one true cure all solution is not found yet, I know pushing refugees out of our country (a person who has been forced to leave their country in order to escape war, persecution, or natural disaster) is NOT an answer. It is an easy political cop out. And if we know anything about politics in war and past, it is not easy.
If you say "But we MUST do something!" Diplomacy and not bombing the shit out of people (while you fail to connect the bombing of those people to the bombing of your loved ones in independent terrorist attacks) is something, not "nothing." In reality, with all the new leaders coming up in different strong countries, and the US with Donald Trump, we are at the highest chance for another huge international war. Soon, an impatient "I WANT TO DO MORE!" becomes a "WE SHOULD HAVE DONE LESS" when you find yourself in the fighting lines against the very people you tried to keep out, not because they were the terrorists, but because you let the few bait you and their own people against you.
Patience, diplomacy, and not bullying/blaming countries we have already invaded more than once - may not be the sexiest thing.
But many years from now when you read about this decade in the history books, you would wonder how these people did not notice how their own self fear was keeping them from seeing straight too.
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4/14/17
When I was younger, I had this dark questioning of what "hard work" was when someone said "As long as you work hard, you can succeed." Well...many of us work hard, and do not succeed or get what we want.
I just read this
Stanford University study poised as a "survey" that asked university students to explain how they would study, why they are studying that way, and what their study plan is to tackle the exam, 7-10 days before taking it.
The students who actually took the survey scored about 1/3 of a letter grade higher on average than those WHO DID NOT TAKE THE SURVEY.
The survey is the experimental factor. It pushed the students to strategist their plan some time before the deadline/event actually happened.
"Strategic thinking distinguishes between people of comparable ability and effort." - Patricia Chen (Leader Researcher)
"This can make the difference between people who achieve and people who have the potential to achieve, but don't...Blind effort alone, without directing that effort in an effective manner, doesn't always get you to where you want to go."
Although this is an academic result, I believe this applies to general problems people have when it comes to hard work vs efficient results. So you "work hard" and worked "6 hours" on this art/economic/math/lawn/computer/etc project. Someone else "studied even less time" or "just did this" or
"tried this art method" got the same result. That must mean "life is not fair" or "I'm not good enough."
Not true, and do not fall into that way of thinking.
I cannot remember how many times someone has told me "I worked this hard on something, and someone still beat me. Some people are just smarter than others." WELL BOO FUGGIN HOO. They just specialized/figured out how to get the same if not better result. Learn from them (if they're cheating, DO NOT learn from them. Don't learn stupid habits) instead of use them as totem for not striving 120%.
"Keep on pushing no matter how hard it gets." <--- I have a problem with this quote too.
I add this:"- Unless you are doing the same thing over and over again and expecting something different. Then stop. Do not make yourself miserable for no reason." "When you have the opportunity to make a mistake, make it." <--- And I have a problem with this quote.But one day, you will make one heck of a mistake with that ideology, and really screw yourself over.
I add this:"-You do not have to make all the mistakes yourself. Learn from people who have made mistakes and want to share what they learned. Do not try all the mistakes for yourself. There are faster ways to learn." Look at efficiency of PROCESS (Was this really the best way to do it? Could you have done this and ended up with the same result?) instead of judge the RESULTS and think that must mean you failed/succeeded, because that is what people tell you.
Analyze/observe what made this situation different than the others, so you can try something new, and inevitably have control over failing/succeeding (this does not work if you are overly critical and hard on yourself).
Things do not have to be harder EVERY TIME. Your body specializes in "adapting." Do not make your mind centuries behind what your body can do. Look to "study efficiently", "say things efficiently", "research efficiently", "do paid work efficiently", etc, and people will notice you are not just the everyday person: you seek to progress and IMPROVE YOURSELF WITHOUT BEING TOLD TO.
Some people improve slower than others. But they may be the ones with highest level of potential than those who "breeezeeeee by" because they stayed long enough to understand instead of just "pass" that part of life/the test.
When I was in middle school and high school, I thought I was not as smart as others, because they picked up concepts faster than me. But because of that self opinion, I stayed later in classes and asked a lot of questions and made sure I understood it. Some people called me "smart." I was really ill-confident and thought I was so behind, so really, I was constantly trying to "catch up", which gave me a goal.
As long as you get to a result you are proud of, AND KEEP LOOKING FOR MORE GOALS TO FULFILL/CATCH UP TO, people who are better than you are not sources of jealousy and resentment, but inspiration and something to shoot towards. You start improving process (which helps you later in the long run) instead of looking at results (which is only one simple and misleading "look") with a polarized: NO / YES.
On a totally relevant note,
...I decided to play Sims 3 and sleep and eats a tremendous amount of food and play with my dog instead of come to DA for my school break. I am sorry. But the natural followup after saying "I am sorry" is "I am not actually sorry."
I think I should draw something ridiculous. Happy Mother Day everyone! I WILL GET TO YOUR COMMENTS EVENTUALLY *6 weeks later*
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3/29/17
I won 2nd place ($500) + Excellence in Undergraduate Research Award ($100) for the university's College of Business Elevator Pitch Contest!- Where you pitch a business idea that has viability in the market -
Thank you very much to those who voted and commented for the
research poll and
finalist status post announcement. I took screenshots of your comments and poll results to use during the presentation when vouching for an interest in an art website alternative that has a different model of moderation, art feature, and professionalism compared to DeviantArt.
I pitched
Tier Art, a tier (level/hierarchy) based art social media website that moves members up "tiers" with unlocked art and premium awards (ex: ability to review new art supplies, crowd sourcing, livestreaming, discount prices for art and print shop) to gives artists a goal (or "tier) to improve themselves.
Projected Startup Costs & Industry Estimate:
We were also told we won the
Excellence in Undergraduate Market Research Award ($100) and must present in the Student Scholar Symposium, among the graduating research theses (arughh).
Also, I found out my elevator pitch engineering partner Sibyl (
) ran away from her dysfunctional parents when she was 16, lived with her grandmother, her grandmother's house got foreclosed, Sibyl did not want to give up her college education by moving with her grandma, so she chose to be homeless for 2 months living in the forest near the school before a university math professor took her in, and now, she is living in her own apartment working as a server for Azalea Trace and math tutor (I met her at the tutoring lab), saving up money to buy a new apartment with her boyfriend. When we won 2nd place ($250 for both of us), she said "All right! Now, I can skip work this weekend and have time to study for finals!") If the university was not the one splitting the prize checks, I would easily give Sibyl more. Even if I did 70% of the project and asked her onto the team at the last minute (presenting for a cash competition is tedious/boring without a homie), I just go online and buy gardening supplies with excess money. Some people need it to pay rent.
Here's some of her art. She is an artist too (I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW THAT. I AM GOOD AT CHOOSING THE RIGHT PEOPLE FOR NO GOOD REASON)! I told her she needs to join DeviantArt, and if she does not want to, just create Tier Art, and I will meet her on there, haha:
Thank you so much for you guy's help and supporting shenanigans!
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3/9/17
I thought it was kind of a shame that I am such a professional student, but academic classes FLY by each semester, and I go to the next class, next test, next teacher, next semester, without batting an eyelash.
Even though professors tell you to sit down and "learn", the system of "graduating in 4 years," robotically fulfilling shadowing/volunteering experience for the career path you think you want at that moment, advisers telling you the same non-personal things, and horrible and amazing teachers all in the same 6 months: this system sometimes encourages one not to retain, reflect, and reserve, but to push, jump, and skip your way to a "success" you do not understand yet, until you...."get there"? That means you constantly ask yourself, "What is the next step?" "What is the means to an end?" - to the end you cannot see?
It does not help that universities boast retention rate while also boasting they push students to graduate in a limited amount of time or their financial aid will be cut off, and they will pay extra fees. Many of those students are scholars and simply wanted to learn more, and are taught being "curious" means more fees and less support from their university. Many of these students that stay for longer and really put time into accurately pursuing what they want are the most successful ones to graduate, not the ones that graduate immediately and did not have any time to reflect on what they "learned", because of all the work, family, and other chores/obligations they unfortunately juggled.
To put it simply:
If you do the hard thing, but don't have time to learn what the heck you picked up from the hard thing, what's the point of doing the hard thing?This system is funny, yet I am still here, wanting to beat it. I told myself in senior year of high school that being an undergraduate with debt, although it was common, was ridiculous, and not something I would do. If I did not have the money myself through scholarships, jobs, and my own means, I would not go to college. The government gave my brother and I our Green Card (US permanent resident card) A FEW MONTHS before college started. The Green Card is necessary for scholarships, government grants, and student funding to get a higher degree. Our high school guidance counselor had to beg and send letters to USCIS, and then miraculously, we got it.
No immigrant family funded by construction and nail work can fund 2 kids under a new US college education on their own. I will never put that burden on my parents. One day, I want to buy them a house (before the tragic plane/car crash when they die) for the sacrifice they took to give us a better opportunity/life here (which is why I find it funny Trump words immigrants to be ungrateful and destroying the system, when we would not purposely drop everything to move here if we did not love this country as much if not more than he does). My father was a doctor, and my mom was a nurse back in Vietnam. I do not even understand applying for Life Insurance for my loved ones (WHO ARE MY LOVED ONES), but apparently, my parents will leave their relatives for a foreign country and strip all the credentials they worked for just to see their children "start over". That means a lot. So education is the role model my parents let me play with more than anything.
Both students and teachers put so much work into these university courses I am taking, and like the rebellious neanderthal that I am, I refuse to let a fast-pace setting and administrative/higher up/parental pressures push me,
OR YOU, towards apathy in academics. Here, at a university/academic institution/learning space, there are huge opportunities to better yourself, and you cannot let the person watching or behind you push you to un-humanly move as fast as them.
They probably had no time to look back at all. In the process of "getting that degree," "getting that position" and "becoming that someone," they forgot to look back and reflect on what was, how, when, and where.
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3/9/172016 Fall Semester, my favorite class was
[STA 4173] Biostatistics ( ) (I received a B), a Biology-based statistical analysis course that teaches you ANOVA, Analysis of Variance, Multiple Comparisons, Simple Linear Regression & Correlation, Contingency Tables, and other statistical analysis tools to understand Biology factors/data research and make conclusions/meanings out of it. We were testing the strangest questions like "Does being tall lead to a higher income?" or "Are darker-feathered turkeys dying from drowning more than light-feathered turkeys?", and if we had the data, we could make a "conclusion" and give a data-driven answer! It was amazing to realize that these answers, that you see in big scientific journals cited with many different authors among many years of research- their answers can be implied in 75 minutes looking at data sheets in this class.
My Biostatiscs teacher was
Dr. Okafor, and I was told by my electrical engineering tutor friend Zach that "Okafor is the worse, oh my god. He is so difficult." For most of the semester, Dr. Okafor would come to class 10-15 minutes late, and I would add up the number of minutes he owed us, to be a full class time. That was how late he was, but when he comes in, he has his supplies ready, he writes notes by hand on the projector (and they are DANG GOOD NOTES- I molded my notes to be a as clean and outlined like his afterwards), and his teaching style is literally "disappointed dad." He would say, in his Nigerian accent. "If I ask the class a question, you can answer and speak up. I do not care if you are wrong. If you are wrong, that is great, If you are correct, that is great. But silence is bad. Silence does not teach anything."
His tests are a roller coaster you wish you could jump off of. He gives us 1.25 hours to finish a mostly statistical analysis exam with all work shown, and if you miss one part of a technique, THE WHOLE PROBLEM IS WRONG.
^ That is one problem. ONE PROBLEM! Worth 20 points!I wish I was not such a knowledge junkie, because I loved studying and putting together all the analysis tools and study guide.
I recommend "
micro-notes" to those who want fast-studying "at a glance" to be a more innovative and quick way to review notes. It is better than flipping through countless pages you can lose. Why do you think phones are so convenient? Because you can view MORE information than what was offered (ex: computer) on something smaller and more compact in your pocket. Have a habit of making your notes like that too, and micro-noting really helps you determine what is most important, if you hypothetically only had this study guide to study right at a glance before the test.
Biostatistics also had an end-of-the-year group project (spoiler: it was horrifying), where you use all the statistical analysis tools you learned to answer a hypothetical question you are interested in (ex: "Is coral bleaching increasing as sea temperature levels rise?"), find real data on it, write a full report, and make a 8 minute presentation with a PowerPoint, based on the report. This group project was 20% of the class grade.
Please, hear me out on this following rant:
I was a part of Team #2. He picked out our team members for us. ...I was stuck with
Madyson in my team. I sent mass reply-all emails pushing my team members to agree on a topic early. Madyson did not reply to the email.
For a report get-together, Madyson shows up late, despite having NO IDEA what happened with previous lectures because of her allergies and no email responses, and she STARTS CONTROLLING THE GROUP. One thing I do not like. I can accept leadership when you did your research. I do not accept leadership when you are an amateur. I correct her on things she is saying to write, because that is statsitcally wrong, and she said "Why?", and I EXPLAIN IT (she would know if she went to class); then she said more ignorant things, and then interrupts me when I reply and says "Whatever. I'm just saying things. I don't know what I'm talking about. Haha!"
...People like this, who joke about their uselessness like a prop, ARE A WASTE OF MY TIME. ^ Breakdown of the CDC data through chi-square analysis While practicing for the group project presentation, Madyson is able to get Lauren off subject, and they start talking about other classes and pizza and sorority sisters. I verbally spoke out loud one slide, and Madyson says "No, you're doing the next slide. I'm doing this one." And I said "Wait, do you know the background of the slide?" And she says "Well, I'll just make it really sound like I do. I know you thought up of the idea, but if I don't say this, it would look like I didn't do any work."
Madyson has this nervous streak from the little time I am with her, where she talks fast, says something conclusive on her own, and then turns away to not see the reaction of the person. She did that just then to me. If she HAD looked at my face at that moment, that face said
"No, that's correct. You didn't do much for this project, and you're going to take credit for what was not yours." Then she jokingly said "Now, STRAIGHT TO YOU, BUU!" and gave me a finger symbol to transition to my next side about MATERNAL DEATH RATES, and I said "Madyson, please don't do that. That's unprofessional." And she said "I don't care about being unprofessional. I mean, that's like, someone's standards on you." I understand this. "Since you said don't do that, I'm definitely going to do it during the presentation!" with a big smile. But I don't understand when people who use "brave standards" to abuse courtesy for sensitive topics and other's opinions.
Seriously, guys, being mature is about personality. You can spin around in an office chair, play with dolls, have massive amounts of Legos, and still sleep with night lights because you are afraid of the dark. You can still be a mature person. Madyson was not mature with her "brave talk to being herself despite what people thought", no matter how much she wanted to fall back on "I'm me! I don't care what others think!"
That was the most annoyed I was in a long time. -To hear my ideology of standards being used to justify disregarding/ignoring a group member's ask for professionalism and politeness, who share her grade. <--- Accurate description of how Madyson talks
Madyson (I know. When will she stop EXISTING IN THE PROBLEMS OF LIFE) also had an Organic Chemistry Lab final test RIGHT AFTER our presentation, since she opted for the team to go last when the teacher asked what turn we wanted. But she would miss her exam because of this, so right before class presentations started, I had to MOTHER her to review to Dr. Okafor that she had an exam.
I raised my hand, Dr. Okafor asked "Yes, Buu?", and I mentioned a general comment about the presentations, and then said "Oh", turned my head to Madyson who sat in the back, and said "Madyson, do you want to add about your exam to him?" And she said "Uhhh...." shyly.
And then Madyson, like a timid sheep that "doesn't care what people think!", explained to Dr. Okafor that our team cannot go last because of her exam, and I said "That's right." And I looked
straight at Madyson instead of the teacher while saying this. "Instead of going last, we want to go first." And she gives me the "What?" expression. And I give her the
"Yes, bitch. We are going first." expression. The "I've had it up to hear with your dumb ass prissy half decisions that have no basis in the group, and you are listening to me, because you have proven you don't know jack shit about what is going on, and I do." face.And Dr. Okafor is like "Okay!"
like a happy go lucky guy that someone would actively volunteer to go first, and we ace the presentation (and yes, Madyson did the stupid "NOW, STRAIGHT TO YOU, BUU!" shout and finger signal), and we take the final, and Biostatistics was over.
The conclusion is Dr. Okafor is a frustratingly interesting and systematic teacher, and Madyson is an everyday idiot.
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2/23/17 +
Wix.com, the self-website-building website company, has bought DeviantArt for $36 million around this Thursday. That means the ~325 million art pieces , 40+ million registered members, and ~ $3 million of assumed liabilities now belong to WIX.
I have even custom-made a website through WIX to try it out. It is very easy. The stocks for WIX is about ~$63.8 right now, but I expect it to rise if they help DeviantArt fix the customization, gallery, and REPUTATION/IMAGE to the community.
Before DeviantArt makes statements about being acquired by WIX and "What this means for our community", "Oh, the benefits", "This is a new step to the future", to make it sound like it was the best business deal idea, like almost EVERY acquired business will claim, I will add in my two cents before you are all manipulated by a DA announcement (if they choose to announce it, or stay their hollow inward douche bag-ness and keep things "private" even among the art community that holds them up):
WIX acquired Appixia (Israeli startup for creating native Modern Commerce apps) in April 2014. Then, WIX acquired OpenRest, a developer of online ordering systems for restaurants, in October 2014. If they do not expand, they will just wait for themselves to go stagnant in a changing market economy. You cannot wait for fortune to come from small trinkles of first-interested customers- you acquire other companies to include in your tree house of friends.
But acquiring DA yesterday, to me, is the first sign of them acquiring a direct art community, not just an interface. 100% of DA's capital stock now belongs to WIX, and Angelo Sotira (Co-founder & CEO of DeviantArt) and the interested DA crew will join WIX as well. If WIX does this well, this can help both DA and WIX.
DA is the largest art website currently because of its profile HTML customization, website revisions, and art gallery. But it has a lot of limitations, which WIX's interface and team can help bring new breath to, especially for the horrifying DA mobile app. Artists and creators are the ones who jump start new innovations and companies, so I think that is what WIX is investing in. And what is the supposing largest artist community, accessible on the web?: DeviantArt (DA)
If you do not know, DA's troll population is high due to low staff and transparency, less professional site color/design, and Copyright and Creative Commons licensing violations (some members have been the victims of copyright infringement from convention vendors using artwork illegally on products and prints in 2007) has led to DeviantArt falling in favor among artists, who would move to Tumblr, Intagram, etc.
No matter how much DA tries to claim the rebranding of DA's logo and creating such a heavily wonky and inefficient app (the browser version of DA version is better than the app. What does that tell you?) was a "step towards the right direction", I think they were stepping towards a cliff. Closing off comments, not openly responding to the necessity of the logo change, and then not publicizing much of bug fixes or changes that have been complained about DA for a long time- whatever they were doing, they were losing their community while doing it, and if you cannot EXPLAIN to your community what is happening and WHY and claim this is for the best, yet no physical gain and fired staff is all to show for it, what type of business venture are you?
I was so frustrated with DA that I created the idea of Tier Art as a back up art website business venture, if they annoy me enough.
BUT LIKE CLOCKWORK, the day that I submitted this idea to the university Elevator Pitch Contest, WIX ACQUIRED DEVIANTART!
So I guess I do not have to give up name-brand cereal and cheesecake to afford starting up a company - WIX can give DA a chance, and I can waddle around here, believing there might be a small chance DA will not just be run by idiot optimist Angelo Sotira (I guess he is not that much of an idiot now since he sold the company while the website still has an artist reputation to uphold from years of hard work before).
ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ
DA is lucky to be acquired by WIX.
If WIX is reading, I hope you research into how the community interacts with each other, listen to the DA CEO to hear/understand his roots (because he really does mean his best) and how DA has expanded from artist word of mouth, and integrate your system into DA to give growing artists modern tools that they were not given before, you will have a community on your side, and we can both work well together.
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11/24/16
It is Thanksgiving, one of the university holidays. It is one of the few breaks I have. I feels....different. Is this what a break feels like?
This semester Has been so busy that I would wake up at early to be at school from 8:30 AM - 8 PM regularly. I would come home, and I would wonder if I am good "dog owner" when my dog can only see me for about 20% of his life, and I bet 14% of that is us sleeping.
I was finishing up, to my greatest extent, a Biostatistics report on which ethnicity had the highest effect (using chi square - R x C & 1 x K method) on live birth rates across different age groups in America in 2014. The teacher did not even fully teach chi square before this day ended, and the report and Powerpoint presentation is due either Monday or Wednesday (he has yet to answer my email question on which date he chose...because he conveniently forgot to tell the whole class). My group members were frustrated with doing the report over so many times (I facilitated the project, because there was no way we would be able to finish this project without a schedule).
I did not understand why they were frustrated. Things like this happens a lot. Were they hungry working on the project for so long? Angry I was facilitating so many redoes to get the analysis right? Annoyed they were doing this right before Thanksgiving?
We may be people with family to meet, but we are still university students with classes and projects to do.
I have to finish a take home exam, do some digital commissions I picked up from 2016 Fandom Con, write ~8 Biology Seminar reports with analysis on peer-reviewed articles that are relevant to each seminar and why, I want to take my dog Christo to the vet for his updated rabies shot, go to PepBoys to fix my car headlights, make a phone call to Paypal, Days Inn, and Florida Blue Health Insurance, deposit the convention profit into the bank, my parents want me to visit for Thanksgiving (urgh), TEFL, and do the laundry. And that is just for Thanksgiving break.
But I am not frustrated/stressed. Just busy. I realize I am not frustrated on doing this report so many times because....I am used to this.
I am too busy to care about bad things. Too busy to acknowledge the good things. Too busy to hang out with friends unless there is a business incentive for the university. Too busy to draw artwork for DA. Too busy to see my dog everyday. Too busy to make phone calls. Too busy to notice my new roommate: my landlord brought his wonderful finance Lola all the way from China to the house.
I barely see her because they are asleep by the time I come home.
When I was little, that was my mother's schedule. She woke up early in the morning to make me food, and then left early for work. She would come home near ~10 PM, when I would be asleep. I would barely see my mother. I felt that was sad for both her and I that we could not acknowledge each other's existence with a "Hi" or natural "Are you doing okay?"
It has always been "Go to school." And "Goodbye" with my parents for so long. When I moved out of the house, she cried, like she would miss me. "Why?" I wondered? You guys have felt so far away. Do you even know what my hobbies are, what I love to do, what I want to truly be?
But now, I have that schedule, and I wonder,
"Did I go wrong?"I am playing an app game called
Mystic Messenger. On the route I am on, there is an office worker named ^Jaehee who quits her job from her emotionally and professionally abusive boss (I have a key chain of him on my backpack, ironically), and she realizes the incredible things she COULD have done if she just had free time.
This Thanksgiving is that free time, despite what I listed above.An older gentleman I met in 2016 Fandom Con lives some hours away from me, but he was in town doing errands, and gave me Prismacolor watercolor pencils and a milkshake (I am lactose-intolerant, BUT DUDE. MILKSHAKE) at the university library, where I was typing up my last report. I said "Thank you!" Since he is an engineer, we talked about solar energy, electric cars, oil in the Everglades, his grandchildren wrecking his BMW model (only several were made in the world), and the art of photography (I threw in a lot of what I learned for good photography from DeviantArt).
Afterwards, he told me "Buu, you don't seem like the type to let people into your trust circle!"
He left, and I looked at the watercolor pencils, and I remembered when I had the time and the aspiration to work with these. Where did that go? That creativity? I mean, it is there. But it feels like a pit in my throat. A pit that won't go away. A pit that might grow into a plant eventually, but I keep gulping it down. I do it on purpose, to concentrate on fending off academic storks trying to get it.
Here is a poem I wrote for my first few hours of freedom before finals preparation weeks start next week:
And totally irrelevantly, I wrote another drabble (quick written story/thought) right afterwards in 5 minutes:
In my opinion, I should write children's stories because my stories' morals are so innovative and heart-warming.
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11/9/16
PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP
So it finally happened. By an incredibly surprising Republican sweep of the US Senate and Congress, and presidency, we see Donald Trump as the next United States President on November 9, 2016. The majority of polls were wrong, and Democrats AND Republicans were surprised. But one thing is certain:
THE PEOPLE HAVE SPOKEN.
I am not for Trump by any means, but I believe in individuality. And as Trump imposed his individuality to lead his campaign, so too can the government individuals, Republican, Democrat, Green Party, Libertarian, etc, impose their individuality back.
When people say "This is not what America is", they are wrong. There is no one America. America is what you make it to be. That is why political elections like this can end up like this: Hillary Clinton (Democrat) winning by popular vote, but Donald Trump (Republican) winning by Electoral College. The Electoral College can be revised, the GOP can be revised, health care can be revised, social media impact on campaigns can be revised- THIS IS THE POINT OF THE POLITICAL TRANSITION.
More than half of Democrats will say they are afraid of the Republican party. If you ask the Republican party, they will say the same about the Democrats. They do not try to understand each other. The uncertainty and error looks like a long-running divorce of the bi-partisanship of the United States, something that US citizens that are told this is a "great country" is great only in its conflict from Britain to its conflict with Iraq to its conflict with ISIS to its conflict within itself with racism, sexism, and narrow minded personal space while claiming you accept your neighbor.
The accepted hypocrisy while claiming we are one of the most open countries in the world, I believe, has bred not only the blind support for Donald Trump as an angry supporter, but a COMPLACENCY for "what happens" if you do. We preach what we do not follow, and accept change when it is convenient, not when it is needed. Not when it is logical. Not when it has evidence vs change that has no evidence.
In the future, I recommend for my American people, as an American citizen for the first year of my life and the first year I could vote, that you take political elections seriously with as much unbias and anti-hypocrisy as you are possible. Pretend you are not a part of a registered party. Pretend you have no dramatic alienated situation for friends and family, connected to immigration and societal norms (homosexuality, Christianity, gender, etc). Vote for what you think is right, as an individual.
Be educated. As an individual. Not pressured by those around you. Do not flock to people because others tell you should have "patriotism" and "loyalty" to your party, faith, and gentleman/ladylike standard. No race, religion, gender, nationality, etc. defines you. You define you.
Who do you vote for?
And if so, that person will reign you for so long. If not, I recommend you reign yourself and research, analyze, and study why and how you came to be, to elect who you want America to be next time.
And accept those consequences. Or step up, and do something when it does not go your way. Inevitably.
That is what Trump supporters AND Hillary supporters have done, and no matter how momentous this election was, I am proud of both sides._______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________7/21/16