So lads, just got my final year results. I'm going to graduate with a 1st in mathematics despite going to literally 2% of my lectures, handing in only half my assignments, and learning all the material by reading the textbook in the one or two days before the exam.
Have I finally proved I'm not a brainlet?
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Hmm... Ok?
No. Sounds like you went to a shitty university with piss poor standards. A give away for that is having assignments in your final year.
Sorry, I just wanted to brag.
Top 10 in the UK, top 50 in the world.
You're gonna hurt yourself in the long run.
Imagine training for a marathon by just doing a few laps around a track the week before the race.
I'm done with academia now. To use your analogy, I trained for my marathon by running a few laps around the track the week before the race, I successfully completed my marathon, and now I'm ending my running career. It doesn't matter anymore, I already achieved what I wanted.
If you plan on going into applied math, your lack of motivation will show sooner or later.
I have worked with people like you OP. Even if you managed to graduate from a top tier university with top grades by coasting, you will almost certainly fall flat on your face in a respectable job in industry or in academia. You are a brainlet for not realizing this.
Wish you the best bro you showed those boring lecturers
If he likes his job he's naturally going to put in the effort.
>Top 10
>UK
That's where you went wrong.
It's top 5 for maths in the UK. Once you rule out Oxbridge (they rejected me) and the London universities (didn't want to study in London), it's the best.
no. you showed you have no commitment to the material, and will not make a valuable employee anywhere.
you also won't be able to employ yourself if you can't do the work you need to
Not necessarily. Being first could just mean everyone else is insanely stupid.
he means a first degree you illiterate monkey
Durham?
well that's no big deal, everybody's first degree is easy (high school)
If you have talent , then use it instead of letting it waste away.
I did something similar to OP but my grades weren't as high. I realized though that I need to get my behavior in order before I get real job. I also found out that I actually have ADHD so hopefully getting that treated will help me straighten out my work ethic.
Honestly though, I'll probably keep half-assing my way through life because I can.
I meant a first class degree. In the UK there are 5 classifications: 1st, 2:1, 2:2, 3, pass (without honours). I got a 1st, the best grade.
Fuck I really want a 1st or 2:1 when I start studying next year but I just already know that I'll be too lazy and not work hard enough, no matter what I tell myself
>shitty university with piss poor standards
>A give away for that is having assignments in your final year.
Just do what I did. Skip all your lecture and classes, they're too boring. Lecture notes should be available online or sold by the undergraduate office. The day before an assignment is due, read the relevant section of the lecture notes (takes an hour or two) then spend the next 2 or 3 hours doing the assignment. If you're too lazy to hand in all your assignments that's fine, at my university they only counted for 15% of the overall grade so you make up for it in exams. You will almost always have at least one day between each exam which is plenty of time to read the entire lecture notes or relevant sections of the textbook. You can do past papers if you have time, if you don't have time to do them at least look at them to see what sort of questions you can expect.
Doing this you can expect to just about scrape a first class degree like I did, assuming you're not a brainlet. One of the benefits is that you basically have unlimited free time, so I had a part-time job, joined a few sports teams and societies, and managed to become fluent in 2 languages.
I think you've said more about your classmates than you have about yourself.
Sure thing buddy. Post student card and I'll believe you.
Assignments in your final year should really only be to see how you're doing.
>Assignments in your final year should really only be to see how you're doing.
So what are you getting a grade based on then if it's not assignments?
Exams.
>Exams.
Final exams in upper level math courses are silly though, isn't the point of school to train you to work in the field of your degree? Mathematicians don't do work by locking themselves in a room for 3 hours with no resources
>Final exams in upper level math courses are silly though
They've been good enough throughout all of history. It's only been in the past couple of decades that coursework has become more prominent.
> isn't the point of school to train you to work in the field of your degree?
No the point of school is to impart knowledge, and then test that you both understand and can apply that knowledge. Having coursework really could really come down to (particularly in the internet age) just googling or asking math exchange. Coursework doesn't separate those that don't understand the material from those that do.
>They've been good enough throughout all of history. It's only been in the past couple of decades that coursework has become more prominent.
en.wikipedia.org
>No the point of school is to impart knowledge, and then test that you both understand and can apply that knowledge. Having coursework really could really come down to (particularly in the internet age) just googling or asking math exchange.
Showing you're able to apply knowledge can be tested through coursework too though, and the portion of solved exercises online is negligible compared to the available pool of questions. Plus despite it being harder, people can cheat on exams too.
>Fallacyfag
You people are so fucking obnoxious, just because something is a fallacy doesn't mean it's incorrect (I believe that's called argument from fallacy). Address the argument.
>Showing you're able to apply knowledge can be tested through coursework too though
Or you can just go to math exchange and ask. It doesn't test shit. Exams are objectively the superior way of testing your knowledge.
>people can cheat on exams too.
Much harder than cheating on coursework.
Warwick?
>You people are so fucking obnoxious, just because something is a fallacy doesn't mean it's incorrect (I believe that's called argument from fallacy). Address the argument.
You fell into a fallacy precisely because you provided no argument. Do you not know how these work? At least read the wiki page before you post again
>Or you can just go to math exchange and ask. It doesn't test shit. Exams are objectively the superior way of testing your knowledge.
Yes, you could go on math exchange, similarly you can cheat on an exam. I'm not arguing from the point of view of a school administrator trying to minimize cheating, I'm arguing from the point of view of trying to best evaluate a student's knowledge and abilities.
>Much harder than cheating on coursework.
So?
You got me.
Look user, just because you're a brainlet doesn't mean the rest of us are. Exams are the best way to assess whether someone has understood the material, since they have nothing to relay on other than their own brain. No books. No internet. No discussion with their peers. Just themselves.
What good is knowing someone can work in a bubble? No one in reality works like this. If all your university cares about is knowing someone can perform like this then sure, exams may test better, but at serious institutions where students are trained to be future researchers and not just a student number, you want to evaluate how that student performs in an analogous environment
Also, assignments inherently give evaluators the opportunity to present more interesting and difficult problems since the student has much more time to spend on them. The drawbacks that come from limitations on exams greatly outweigh any benefit
>No one in reality works like this
But before you can get to the stage of working in reality you must first understand what's been taught to you. If you can't do that, then moving on is completely irrelevant.
>but at serious institutions where students are trained to be future researchers
No. I went to Edinburgh, most of my final year exams were 100% exam, there were a couple that were 5% (spread over 6 course works). Unless you took some programing modules in which case it was continuously assessed. AFAIK the same is true at Oxford and Cambridge. They choose exams over coursework for the reasons I've already stated, only exams test your knowledge, coursework doesn't.
>you want to evaluate how that student performs in an analogous environment
Why do you assume that coursework tests someone? I've already listed someways in which it completely fails to test anything.
>assignments inherently give evaluators the opportunity to present more interesting and difficult problems since the student has much more time to spend on them.
Assignments give groups of people a chance to work on harder problems. It isn't testing an individuals ability.
>Why do you assume that coursework tests someone?
For the same reason you assume exams test someone.
>Assignments give groups of people a chance to work on harder problems.
You can tell students not to collaborate just as you can tell students not to cheat on an exam, this isn't an argument.
>For the same reason you assume exams test someone.
Because you're locking them in a room with no resources but themselves to complete a series of questions? Doesn't sound like coursework to me.
>You can tell students not to collaborate just as you can tell students not to cheat on an exam, this isn't an argument.
But stopping people cheating on an exam is much easier than stopping them from collaborating. For one, in a standard exam hall, you aren't allowed to talk to each other. Whereas with coursework, there's nothing stopping you from talking to each other.
>Because you're locking them in a room with no resources but themselves to complete a series of questions? Doesn't sound like coursework to me.
As I said, testing ability to do math, not test ability to work in a bubble
>But stopping people cheating on an exam is much easier than stopping them from collaborating.
Yet cheating still happens, every year, around the world. People can take phones to the bathroom and use google, bring in concealed notes, etc...
You seem to be working under the assumption that everyone is trying their hardest to cheat, I don't know what kind of school you went to but I guess my more realistic/practical point of view comes from going to universities where students actually wanted to learn the material.
How is it possible to cover a years worth of content in 1 or 2 days?
It's not a year's worth of content in 1 or 2 days, it's one module's content. A module is 30 hours of lectures. To give you an example of how big the modules were, chapter 1 of Hatcher's Algebraic Topology was one module. Is it possible to read and understand a chapter of that book in one day? Well it was for me.
>As I said, testing ability to do math, not test ability to work in a bubble
Then you're wrong. Quite simply. Coursework only "test" your ability to network with friends, look stuff up in books, google. That's not a test in any way I understand it. As far as I can tell most employers and administrators see it that way as well.
>Yet cheating still happens
I'm sure it does. The point is it's much harder to do. I can be fairly certain that if someone had a 100% exam module, then they achieved their grade based on nothing but their own smarts. If I see a large coursework component, I think that there's a strong chance that you had help from your friends.
>People can take phones to the bathroom and use google, bring in concealed notes
Do you not use invigilators in your country?
>I guess my more realistic/practical point of view comes from going to universities where students actually wanted to learn the material.
>Oxbridge don't want their students to learn the material
kek. I guess this is another "anyone that disagrees with me is axiomatically wrong" post from some faggot on Veeky Forums. Guess what bro, they don't do re-sits either. At Oxford there finals are held at the end of either year three or four and largely determine your classification.
>Coursework only "test" your ability to network with friends, look stuff up in books, google.
Sounds like how researchers do their work. Which is what I've said this whole time, testing math ability, not ability to work in a bubble.
>Do you not use invigilators in your country?
Do invigilators in your country enter the bathroom stall and watch you shit?
>kek. I guess this is another "anyone that disagrees with me is axiomatically wrong" post from some faggot on Veeky Forums. Guess what bro, they don't do re-sits either. At Oxford there finals are held at the end of either year three or four and largely determine your classification.
This is not about 'anyone' that disagrees with me, this is about you. No need to deflect. And why the homophobia? I have no idea what this 'classification' is anyway
>Sounds like how researchers do their work.
But you aren't a researcher, you're a student. You haven't yet demonstrated the competence to get that far.
>Do invigilators in your country enter the bathroom stall and watch you shit?
They check the stalls and make you turn your pockets out before going in. At some places they don't let you shut the door and stand just out of sight.
> And why the homophobia? I have no idea what this 'classification' is anyway
>Pic
Oh I see, you were "merely pretending".
>But you aren't a researcher, you're a student. You haven't yet demonstrated the competence to get that far.
Are students banned from doing research at your school? I did research work in the summers after my second and third years
>They check the stalls and make you turn your pockets out before going in. At some places they don't let you shut the door and stand just out of sight.
Pockets aren't the only places you can hide notes (socks, shoes, sleeves, etc.)
>Oh I see, you were "merely pretending".
Pretending what? Calling me a faggot was uncalled for. I still don't know what the relevance of this classification is.
When I was doing my masters in chemistry with very good results, I always wondered if I were a genius or if everyone was simply more of a brainlet than me and struggling with piss easy topics.
To this day, after a second degree, I still don't know the answer,
>Trying to prove you aren't a brainlet
>Posting on Veeky Forums
I have bad news
What were the languages
Russian and Kazakh.
Time to move back in your parents and spend the rest of your life browsing Veeky Forums.
How does one come to terms with the fact that he's a brainlet? It's truly soul crushing.