My dad had that dream, until he was drafted. After that, his bad dreams were about being back in the Army.
I have that dream, and I’ve been out of college for mumble mumble years.
I also have the classic variant, The Actor’s Nightmare, where it’s almost time for my entrance and I realize I’ve never memorized my lines.
I have this dream, but in my case, I am back in school, after 3+ years off (I got a degree, hated the job and career prospects, decided to go back to school for something else.)
So I have very realistic versions of the dream, complete with current classmates and profs, and sometimes even the actual courses I’m taking, and they are often mixed with real situations from my previous job/career, and I wake up not knowing what to believe. It can be very stressful!
When I have it it’s worse than having to go back to college – I have to back to high school! And I graduated 14 years ago. It’s awful.
And it’s worse when it’s combined with the mysterious vanishing clothing. Sometimes I’ll have dreams where my clothes are somehow disappearing, usually one piece at a time. Having that happen while trying to get to class since I’m back in high school…eeeeek!
I’ve had to go back to high school and middle school in those dreams.
I occasionally have that dream too, but it’s different now that I’m older. Even in the dream there’s some part of me that’s saying: “Relax. It’s just a dream”.
I have this dream quite often, but like Cuncator, there always comes a time in my dream when I suddenly think “Wait a second; I have a degree. Why does this matter?”
Sometimes the dream will have me in high school missing a class, and I’ll realize “Hold on a minute. I already went to university; it doesn’t matter how I did in high school anymore.” At that moment of realization the dream switches to something else and suddenly I’m playing tennis with Abe Lincoln.
Like everyone else, I have this dream with fair frequency. But, the way I see it, while the dream itself is nothing fun, the immense relief that comes when you wake up makes it all worthwhile.
Me, too, and it’s always a math class.
My mom has a similar one where she’s invited a bunch of people to a party, and forgot about it. So people are knocking on the door, and the house isn’t cleaned, there’s no food, she’s in her robe, etc.
But Northern Piper, at least you can find your class to fail in. Half the time I have that dream, I don’t even make it to class because I can’t find it. I spend the whole damn dream wandering around, getting bad directions, and worrying about being late (this sometimes is part of the other college dream I have: wandering a dorm and not being able to find my way out. I last lived in a dorm 9 years ago!) The rest of the time I do find the class only to discover like you I have no idea what I’m doing.
Recently, though, I had a dream that was a third varation: in the new type of dream I’ve been signed up for grad school and no one tells me until I go to work for a meeting and discover that I’ve been duped into attending a class.
In mine, there are 2 standard variants:
a) I apparently forgot to drop calculus, and the exam’s in a couple of days, so I need to learn calculus, which is really hopeless, and especially so since my textbook’s in my locker that I forgot I even had, much less know the combination to.
b) I apparently forgot to drop a history course, and the term paper’s due in 3 days, and I don’t have a topic or know anything about the subject, and I’m wandering around the library trying to figure out something that I already know enough about to have a thesis marginally related to the course and whip some crap together. I wonder if the teacher likes me enough to give me an incomplete?
Throw in some locker room trauma and abject-poop-dream elements for good measure.
Now that I’ve been teaching a bit I get the new variants:
Conference presentation gone awry: Oh noes! The projector is broken/powerpoint is corrupted and I forgot to print out a copy of my paper!
Academic job search: about the same, but as an interviewee. Oh, and I forgot to bring a dress-shirt so I’m in a t-shirt and wrinkled blazer and I left my wristwatch at home and have no comb and I’m late to meet the dean.
Exam time again. . . but I’m giving it! And I forgot I was giving one today/ yesterday! And I forgot to make photocopies! And the impatient students are about to mutiny! Ah, here’s comes the department chair to ask what’s up! Whee!
I’ve had the high school one before. And still do have it, but not as often; I’ve not been to any classroom for about 12 years. Sometimes my old classmates will be there, sometimes they are replaced or mixed in with people I know today. And I’m always late, always panicked, and something always goes wrong. Last time it happened, I was taking classes with two of my co-workers, learning crucial things about the company. In the dream, I realised that my husband (who has recently made manager) was teaching a class, so I decided to sneak out of my class early and go surprise him. Naked.
I snuck down the hall to the room I knew he would be teaching, threw open the door and stood there in all my naked glory, grinning like a maniac… only to realise it was the president and CEO of the company, looking at me like I’d lost my mind. I played it off like I had intended to do that, and I sauntered into the classroom to get something off of a shelf. I then sauntered casually back out, dying inside. Not to be deterred, I tried the door on the other side of the hall, thinking I just had things backwards. No dice there, either; I jumped naked into a classroom of my other co-workers, and my manager, all who looked far more amused than necessary. Sigh. Withered, I walked to a shelf in that classroom and got something, then wandered back outside and put my clothes back on. My husband then opens a door further down the hall, but by then I just want to keep my clothes on. Ah, well.
On the other hand, I’ve been having *the pear * dream again…
First one to get that reference gets a hearty thumbs up.
Anastasaeon “All is lost…” KITH for the win! 
It was actually the first thing I thought of when I saw the thread title…
On topic, I’ve had this dream several times. It’s weirdly disturbing to me, but I figured it was just because I always like to be prepared for everything. It almost makes me feel better that so many other people have the dream.
The worst for me is the “Oh my dear god my teeth are crumbling to pieces in my mouth and I’m spitting them out” dream, but I digress.
Damn you all! Damn you all! And damn me for reading this thread!
Last night I had the Dream. 
Yeah I often have that dream too. Or one where it’s the first day of class and I don’t have my schedule so I can’t figure out where to go.
Of course something similar happened in real life… there was this one class that I just one day forgot I had. I didn’t remember until finals week, and the final had already passed. But somehow I convinced the professor to let me take the final anyway and I passed the class. Phew!
I occasionally have that dream.
Might have something to do with my having signed up for a 17th centrury literature course, and then attending an 18th century literature course – failed the 17th and could not get any credit for the 18th.
Come to think of it, I also forgot my own name on my first English lit exam at U of T. Highest grade on the exam, but they had to track me down through my student number.
So did I…just like I talked about in my post. It was high school and I had 2 exams in one morning (Biology* and Calculus) and hadn’t studied for either or gone to any classes. As an added twist, I also hadn’t called my boss at my real life job to let him know that I wasn’t coming in because I had these exams to write.
There’s nothing like waking up with a cold sweat to set a crappy tone for the day.
*I never even took biology in high school.
I also have recurring dreams about having to go to the bathroom and there’s either no doors on the stalls or the stall doors are too small to provide any privacy and I keep wandering around looking for a suitable bathroom. When I wake up, I have to pee REALLY badly!
Yes! That’s what I was “hearing” when I read the thread title, too.
I’ve finally stopped having that dream (been out of school for 30 years or more). Now I have a substitute dream, where I’m back in the military and am missing my flight and can’t find my uniforms. I’ve been retired since 1990.
I have this one, too. In addition to stall door weirdness, often the toilets themselves are really disgusting and dirty, or bizarrely constructed so I’m looking at them thinking, “Hmmm. Just how am I supposed to sit on THIS?”