Supposed To's

Today, we got our E Mch exams back. E Mch (pronounced "ee mehk") is short for Engineering Mechanics. I am in E Mch 213, Strength of Materials, right now.

I took E Mch 211, Statics, over the summer at Penn State York. I got an A. It was ridiculously easy. The professor pretty much gave us all A's.

E Mch 213 is A LOT more difficult. I don't know if it's the fact that I'm taking more classes now that it's the actual semester and not summer session or this professor just isn't as easy a grader as my professor over the summer. Either way, I'm not doing so hot in this class. And by hot, I mean well. I have gotten straight D's on my quizzes, a 75% on my first exam, an 81% on the second exam, and a 53% on the exam I just got back today. I'm going to have to ace the final in order to get any where near the grade I need in this class to keep my GPA at a 3.00.

One annoying thing is that my professor doesn't update grades. Or, I guess he technically does, but I have no idea what my overall grade for the class is. I know how many points I have and how many total points there are in the class thus far, but I don't know how to calculate my grade. It's a problem.

Another thing, which will explain the title of this post, is that I feel like I should be getting an A in this class if I ever want to be a real engineer. I'm supposed to be really good at the material this class teaches. I'm supposed to be able to do things like this in my sleep. I'm supposed to look forward to going to my engineering classes.

E Mch is my most dreaded class this semester. I find it boring and hard to follow. The professor knows all of our names, so it's not like I can use anonymity to cover up my disconnectedness. The only class that comes close to E Mch in dislike-ability is my Spanish 100, Spanish Grammar class. That class is just pointless.

And I know that everyone is going to be like, "Oh, it's just one class! It doesn't matter that much in the long run!" But what if it does? What if the job I end up having is specifically strength of materials? I had thought that my ideal job would be testing stresses on satellites as they are put into orbit, but if I can't pass this stupid class, how will I be able to that every day for the rest of my life? Am I even supposed to be an engineer?