I am going to Germany for mechanical engineering degree. And my studies will be in English language. Neither German nor English are my native language.
I lost about 1 year. What I mean by “I lost about 1 year” is that I didn’t study Maths, Physics and Chemistry but I prepared for IELTS which is an English exam to test your skills relating to English Therefore what remains in my mind from high schools is very little. This worries me extremely so much. I strongly fear dropping out and being unable to finish the program in intended duration.
Nowadays I am trying to study via khanacademy.com to refresh my mind. It helps, especially in learning terminology and expressions in English language. But I don’t think it is sufficient.
1-) Is there any material (maybe book) I can study for university beforehand?
I have heard universities a large amount of students in first year and very little percentage of accepted students can continue their studies ( maybe due to the difficulty of engineering program? or maybe they are not hard studying enough)
2-) What can I do to prevent myself from repeating a semester&year or dropping out? How much will I have to study in a day? Will I have to study daily?
There is also a personal issue but I will go ahead and ask. My father told me he didn’t want me to buy a computer. He knows I love play gaming and computer hardware (overclocking and stuff like that) is my primary hobby. He think it will inhibit my social life in university. Regardless, even tough I agree with him, I will do it any way. I can’t do without a computer.
3-) Should I avoid buying a gaming system?
This topic is perhaps ridiculous and stupid, and pretty embarrassing . But please know that I am seriously asking and need help
Do you mean that you have heard that universities accept a large number of students who won’t be able to succeed in the program and that only a few are able to make it through? I was under the impression that, at least in the US, this is sometimes true for undergraduate (bachelor’s degree) programs, and not often true for master’s and doctorate programs. It’s pretty easy in the US to get into some bachelor’s degree program, and lots of people drop out, change majors, or otherwise have trouble. Grad school is, overall, harder to get into and they place more of an emphasis on allowing only those who are likely to succeed to enroll in the first place. If you are a mediocre student in the US, its pretty easy to “get in to college” if you are ok with going to State U as opposed to Harvard or MIT. They will let you enroll and will gladly fail you.
LOL. This reminds me of an internet meme. I meant:
I am not student in the US. I have no idea about whether I am mediocre student or not. Mmy friends just say I study too much :dubious: By that they mean because I am idiot I have to study too much.
Well, I don’t know a lot about German universities, but at least here in the US, a computer is rather helpful for typing up papers, doing online research (online research is not the end of research, but its a useful means), and keeping in touch.
Do you know if the school you are going to has computer labs? It could be awkward to have to travel around campus and obey the computer lab hours and computer lab policies (e.g. no custom software). I haven’t been truly “in college” in almost ten years but I recently took a class and taking notes on a laptop seemed perfectly acceptable. I also found that having a laptop helped in that I could do classwork sitting pretty much anywhere. Also remember that you have to store your work - do you want to have to email everything to yourself or worry about losing a usb disk?
One, if you’re a student anywhere, you should be getting some assessment of your work. Trust it. Do you tend to get good grades / high marks, or bad grades / low marks?
If you study a lot but still do poorly, it probably has everything to do with how you study. If you can tell us what you do, you’ll get a lot of suggestions for other and more effective ideas.
It could, on the other hand, be that you’ve had an undiagnosed learning disability, but I’ll hold off on that until I hear more.
Your English isn’t perfect, but I’ll wager it’s good enough to start your degree program, and if you will be in Germany you’ll have a lot of company whose English is also imperfect.
I am sure that there are books that you can study beforehand but I don’t know what they are. Does the university have an online forum? Most schools sell used books and some students have old books also. The best thing that you can do for these classes is to study the books that they are using. I’m sure that the internet has hundreds of sites that you can browse for free to increase your knowledge ahead of time, but you should mainly be concerned with what this class is trying to teach you.
The way to make sure that you don’t have to repeat a semester is to work hard and study every day. When you are passing the exams easily, then you know that you can relax your study habits. Most college students are away from their parents for the first time in their lives. They are learning how to control their time and habits after a lifetime of others doing it for them. Many fail because they enjoy the new freedom and don’t focus on the goal.
Get a computer, do not get a gaming system (see #2). Do not install any games on your computer… You are going to waste enormous amounts of time surfing the internet instead of studying. Get control of that now, before you start school.
You have already said that you don’t have a girlfriend, so that won’t distract you from your studies. In a new social environment, you may be tempted to try and get a girlfriend. I think you should concentrate on studying, but social skills will frequently help your career more than talent. You are the only one that can decide how to balance school/social but it will be difficult. I like the philosophy of Al Pacino in Scarface. In this country, you gotta make the money first. Then when you get the money, you get the power. Then when you get the power, then you get the women.
I’ve read some of your other threads, and you seem to be a young man that’s confused and full of fear and anxiety. This can get you good grades if you lock yourself in the dormitory and study hard and don’t talk to anyone. But it seems like you need to become more comfortable around other people also. If you have a roommate at university, this will help you. Once you learn to get along with him, then you can try to get along with someone new. Eventually you will have three or four close friends and everything can become much easier.
Second this. I graduated from engineering school in 1988, and at the time a persona computer was useful but not mandatory. Now I think it’s expected that all students have their own (desktop or laptop, although I think a laptop is more useful). Some classes at some schools assume that the students have their own computers.
I tend to study a lot and get high marks. But other people say I study too much and by only studying too much can I get high marks. They say normal people study less than I study but they can get as high marks as I get. If a few person had said this, I would think they were only hater. But when many of my classmates said the same thing, I have started believing I am dumb.
The school has computer labs. But as you have said it will be hard for me due to the fact that I will have to send everything to myself via e-mail. And I will have to obey computer lab rules&time-table.
What I have understood from your message is that good universities let many students enroll and they take their money. Afterwards they gladly fail them with an intention to get rid of mediocre students. By doing that they will have mediocre students’ money but they will not let them downgrade the quality of their university because they will have already failed them. (If you have mediocre students not genius students, your university will be regarded as not good, downgraded)
Okay. Fact #1: You study more than your classmates for the same amount of material. Fact #2: It is effective.
So the only real worries here are:
Could you study more effeciently? (That is, get the same marks for less study time.)
Interpersonal problems. Your friends don’t like the way you study, you worry about what your friends think.
I don’t think your friends are haters, but consider this: they want you to study less because THEY feel guilty about not studying MORE. Nothing to do with you, everything to do with them.
That said, I bet you could be more efficient in your studying. All of us could. It tends to be very reassuring to go over material we already know well, and it boosts confidence (something that’s clearly an issue for you), but at the same time it’s not very useful. Do you do this? If so, try identifying the material you know very well and just. . . ignoring it. I bet it will decrease your study time without affecting your marks.
German here. You don’t say explicitly, but I assume you are talking about an undergraduate program.
I wouldn’t worry about your English too much. Usually only a minority of the students and lecturers are native speakers. The international language of science is Bad English.
I don’t think that studying anything for your degree in advance makes much sense. One thing that can never hurt is reviewing high school math, but don’t bother with any math beyond that. Many students are surprised how much math that tried to forget years ago is suddenly relevant again. You don’t mention your German. If you don’t know any or very little then try to learn at least a bit.
It’s a bit of everything. In addition to those things many people simply change their subjects but still count among those who left their original programs.
You should. There is a rule of thumb that the time that you work on your own should be about the same as your scheduled hours (and they will have good recommendations for that.) Part of that will be mandatory homework.
If at all possible get a notebook or at least some other PC. Yes, there are computer labs and technically you are not required to have one, but if you don’t you will make your life much more complicated. Get one with a really bad mobile graphics chipset if that helps with convincing your father.
. But please know that I am seriously asking and need help
