Week 29 - Final Class Week!

Solar Vehicle - Vermont Public Interest Research Group

It is crazy to look back at how quickly this school year has gone by! I am proud to have already made it through my first year of college. As a first generation college student this is a huge step forward. I am already looking forward to coming back in late August to start my second year. This week is looking like it is going to be a relatively easy week, but I know that this is simply because it is a review week for next week's final exams. I have 4 exams spanned out from Monday to Wednesday, and then I get to go home for summer vacation on Wednesday night! I enjoy being here at Vermont Tech, and I am sure summer vacation is going to seem like it is just dragging on as I will likely be anxious to get back to school. :-)

The picture above is of a solar vehicle that actually produces enough energy for 3 energy-efficient homes. It is owned by the Vermont Public Research Interest Group and part of the reason why they were on campus is that they wanted to spread awareness about the Green Mountain Yankee power plant. A meeting, or a vote, is supposed to take place sometime soon that will determine whether or not the plant is allowed to run for another 20 years. VPIRG is trying to get the plant to be shut down because it has a history of creating radioactive waste. It was pretty cool to see a vehicle that can actually power 3 homes. According to the drivers the solar panel array on the truck is only about $23,000. This is actually extremely affordable when you consider that the extra energy you don't use can actually be sold back to the grid for a profit, and there are also federal tax incentives. :-)

Well, that is all I have for today. I will likely post again this week since it is the last class week of the school year.

Week 28 - Living in Old Dorm Next Year!!!

"Rock Wall Around Hartness Library"

Only a week and a half remains for my first year of college! This year has been a great success, and I am quite proud to have already made it this far! This week has not only been going by fast, but has also been going quite well.

Vermont Tech held room lottery last night in the Judd Gym, and I managed to get into the best dorm building on campus! I will be living in Old Dorm next year in room 201! Old Dorm gets its name because it is simply the oldest dorm building on campus. It has the largest rooms, and all the furniture is movable. This is HUGE plus for most people.

The furniture in the other buildings is attached to the wall someway or another, so you don't have any real freedom as to how your room is arranged. Old Dorm is also much closer to the buildings where classes take place than Keenan is. Instead of having to walk clear across campus to go to all of my classes I will only have to walk a relatively short distance. The only trip that is going to be lengthened will be my trip to the dining hall for lunch and dinner every day. The thing is: I walk to classes 3-5 times a day. I only have to walk to the dining hall up to twice a day and that is IF I am planning on eating there.

Anyway, I had my second Fundamentals of Circuits II exam today. I think that I did quite well on it, but I haven't gotten my grade back yet. I know that I got all of the bonus questions correct. My favorite bonus question was: "If a ripe tomato is red, and a train leaves Chicago at 60 MPH, what is the value of 2^4?" I still laugh about it on and off... :-)

I have a Tech. Math exam tomorrow that includes some of the stuff covered last semester AND everything that we have gone over in class since the last exam. I am confident that I will do quite well on this exam since the material covered is based on the same exact concepts that we have been covering in circuits all semester. I have been doing a pretty decent job in class, so I am sure that I will do well on this exam. So yup, one more exam this week followed by my last normal week next week, and then a 3-day week of final exams then...

SUMMER VACATION!!!

Week 27 is Flying By!

The weather has been amazing all week! It is nice to know that summer is quickly approaching! I know that this year has seemed to fly right by. I think it is because of how busy the college keeps me with the amount of homework I get.

Anyway, I turned in the rough draft for my research paper today. It is currently 8 pages long without including the 'works cited' page. It is good to know that I don't have to worry about it for now since the final draft isn't due for a couple more weeks. I think that I only have a week left of Research Writing because the final class week is actually going to be used for individual conferences with each and every student between all of the different sections. It will be nice because it means that the week before finals I will have 5 hours cut from my schedule for that week.

Next Monday I have a presentation due that is supposed to be based on my research paper. I have been researching the planet Mars and what steps mankind must take in order to explore Mars and eventually colonize it. It will be interesting because, while some people are given a week to do this assignment, I have only this weekend to complete it. I hate sign-up sheets because it is always obvious which time slots are going to be filled up first and it is unfair to those that get to look at the sheet after everyone else has. The sign-up sheet had time slots for each Research Writing class period of next week, and to no surprise I was stuck with Monday.

I don't have a problem at all with having to do so much work. Sure, sometimes it gets out of hand, but the education gained makes it more than worth it. There are also only two class weeks left, but my last week of Research Writing will be next week. I am also psyched about having my last final exam on Wednesday, May 6th instead of Friday, May 8th. It means that my vacation starts a couple of days early. :-)

Note: The picture above is of the parking lot between the Morey, Keenan, and S.H.A.P.E buildings. Now that all the snow is gone I am able to simply cut across this parking lot for faster access to the campus snack bar, which sure as hell beats walking all the way around the parking lot! :-)

Start of Week 27 - A Busy Busy Week

This week is a super busy week. I have an 8-10 page research paper due on Wednesday on space exploration and the importance of spreading life. I know that the next few weeks are going to be insane since those few weeks are all I have left before summer vacation. I have a 1-hour exam coming up in both Intro. to Technical Math II, and one Fundamentals of Circuits II before actually taking the final exam for all of my classes. Right now it looks like my final day of my first year of college will be on Wednesday, May 6th. This means that my vacation starts two days earlier because my last exam is on that Wednesday. :-)

It has been an extremely busy school year, and I love it. The time has gone by so much faster than it ever did in high school, so before I know it I will have a job in the Burlington area doing what I love to do.

Well, I have a lot of stuff that I need to be doing right now, but I might post on Thursday or Friday since I will be swamped through Wednesday due to my research paper.

Also, the picture above is one I took of the campus snack bar. I edited it with Photoshop to make it look cooler. :-)

End of Vacation - Start of Week 26!

"Pascal's Triangle - Conant Building"

It is hard to believe it, but my first year of college is almost over! While stress from any college is inevitable, I have found that my first year was actually filled with more fun from learning countless new things then it was from college stress, and this is how education should be.

It is crazy, but it is already the beginning of my 26th week. This means that I only have 4 weeks left of classes, and then a week of final exams! As much as I love being here, at Vermont Tech, I am looking forward to my summer vacation. It is just over a month longer than the summer vacation that I am used to from elementary school to high school, so it will actually be the longest summer 'vacation' I have had since before I started pre-school! :-)

I hope to get a job at Best Buy over the summer. It would be nice to work at a store in which the products I have always known a lot about. I actually applied to Best Buy last summer, and managed to get my first job interview, but I think that they didn't want to hire me because I was starting college in just a few weeks, and the application process probably would've taken longer than that. I was also nervous during my job interview, but maybe when I go in again I will do a much better job. I would really like to work there, but if I can't then I will seek employment elsewhere.

I have to run off to C Programming now.... I have an exam in that class today that I should actually do quite well on. :-D