Titles are even harder to think of when you're pissed off
School used to be so much simpler back in the days of Primary, and I'm not referring just to the workload either. Back then, if you were good at the work sheets, you were ruler of the classroom. Football gained you prime position in the playground and any musical talent was fostered and praised by your parents and doting relatives.
Somewhere since then, everything's become kind of muddled. Now, we have to think about all those extra talents in order to plan a written statement full of buzzwords to impress universities. If you played football on a local team for a year, it shows determination and enthusiasm. If you gave it up because you were bored, you can say it was because you wanted to focus on your studies and claim time management skills with an ability to prioritise.
Whenever I get something like this, and they do come up a fair bit over the years, though it's only recently they've begun to count for much, I'm reminded of a short story we once read in English. I don't recall the details, but it involved a man sending away a job application and complaining about the fact that it required his school grades, which were by then well out of date. He complained in thought throughout the story about the ridiculousness of being given a job based on who he was and what he did umpteen years ago.
The man was presented as saying these things because he knew that his grades were bad and that he wasn't going to get the job because of other reasons as well. He was using them as a scapegoat.
Now, the similarities aren't perfect but the principle of the thing is what I worry about. Do I dismiss these extra-curricular activities simply because I haven't done them, when perhaps I should have? Is my subconcious hiding my own inadequacies and turning them into failings in the admissions system? Is your concious mind trying to tell me that I'm overthinking this, getting whiny and that I should shut up?
On all counts but the last one, the answer's probably a distinct "no". But that little niggle keeps coming up no matter how many times I dismiss it.
I really wish I had the time to wrap this up with an adequate conclusion and to provide a balance to what is doubtless nonsense above but I don't. I'm being rushed to bed for reasons that escape all logic and so I have to leave it here. I may come back to it tomorrow unless something interesting happens.
Suffice it to say that I have never understood, nor will I ever understand, the workings of a mind that gives everything I've ever done a list of "Skills and Qualities", attaching to it huge significance and trying to extrapolate from it my entire personality, as it relates to university level Comp. Sci.
Somewhere since then, everything's become kind of muddled. Now, we have to think about all those extra talents in order to plan a written statement full of buzzwords to impress universities. If you played football on a local team for a year, it shows determination and enthusiasm. If you gave it up because you were bored, you can say it was because you wanted to focus on your studies and claim time management skills with an ability to prioritise.
Whenever I get something like this, and they do come up a fair bit over the years, though it's only recently they've begun to count for much, I'm reminded of a short story we once read in English. I don't recall the details, but it involved a man sending away a job application and complaining about the fact that it required his school grades, which were by then well out of date. He complained in thought throughout the story about the ridiculousness of being given a job based on who he was and what he did umpteen years ago.
The man was presented as saying these things because he knew that his grades were bad and that he wasn't going to get the job because of other reasons as well. He was using them as a scapegoat.
Now, the similarities aren't perfect but the principle of the thing is what I worry about. Do I dismiss these extra-curricular activities simply because I haven't done them, when perhaps I should have? Is my subconcious hiding my own inadequacies and turning them into failings in the admissions system? Is your concious mind trying to tell me that I'm overthinking this, getting whiny and that I should shut up?
On all counts but the last one, the answer's probably a distinct "no". But that little niggle keeps coming up no matter how many times I dismiss it.
I really wish I had the time to wrap this up with an adequate conclusion and to provide a balance to what is doubtless nonsense above but I don't. I'm being rushed to bed for reasons that escape all logic and so I have to leave it here. I may come back to it tomorrow unless something interesting happens.
Suffice it to say that I have never understood, nor will I ever understand, the workings of a mind that gives everything I've ever done a list of "Skills and Qualities", attaching to it huge significance and trying to extrapolate from it my entire personality, as it relates to university level Comp. Sci.
posted by Alasdair Corbett at
11:10 PM
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