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Struggling with college...

Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
edited March 27 in Work & Study
Right. I'm all over the place, so if this doesnt make sense please tell me, I just really need someone else's thoughts on this, as my mum and boyfriend are really biased as such.

Basically, I love my course. I love beauty therapy, I really loved last year and completed it "easily" (I say easy, but that's because I put a hell of a lot of hard work and late nights into it haha), and I've made some great friends. I love the general atmosphere there, and really don't want to leave.

Since starting my second year though, I've really started to struggle. It's not because of the work getting harder, even though it has, it's more that I don't feel there's any support or organisation. Becuase of various conditions my family members have (asthma, diabetes and heart conditions are all quite strong runners in my family) I've struggled finding clients for treatments, and have been let down by a few, leading me to fall behind. This hasn't helped with my lecturer refusing to assess more than 6 people at a time - although this sounds reasonable, without explaining the exact specifics of why this is hard for us, it isn't fair as it sounds. So slowly, I'm falling behind, and it's praying on my mind, but whenever I've spoke to my lecturers about it, I'm told to "book clients in then". They fail to understand that my family all work while I'm at college, and don't have the time to just drop a day's work/money to come in and have treatments for me. Yet when I ask if I can come in on my days off to give my clients more options, or work on students from other classes (like I've modelled for several people in the past, including when clients have let me down recently) they say no.

Another thing is our main project (at the moment). We've got to construct a full business plan for opening a beauty salon, but again, I'm struggling. The work is completed each week in the Key Skills I.T lessons, as it contributes to the portfolios for that class as well as our NVQ 3. I completed Level 2 I.T last year, and since this is the highest level our college offers, I only turn up to the I.T classes to work on the business plan and to get my EMA. Thing is, when they all start work on a new part of the business plan, I'm left to do it on my own. Everyone else is given input, but as I'm not working to complete my I.T portfolio, they wont help me. If i ask for help, I'm told to "read the sheet". For instance, we've got to do a write up of various results we have from a questionnaire, and we've got to show evidence of using percentages, ranges, mean/median/mode. While I can handle the percentages, and ranges, with the questions we're using, I struggle to see how I can use all the different averages to give a proper answer. I know how to do the averages fine, I really enjoyed statistics work in Maths at school, but I can't see where I can use them to give a reasonable answer to questions like "Have you ever used a sunbed? Yes = 5 No = 15" and so on. When I asked my tutor, she sat me down and gave me a half hour talk on how to work them out, despite me explaining that I knew how to do them.

Argh. I don't really know what I'm asking, probably what would you do if you were in my situation? It's ended up that I'm sitting here now, struggling through my work, knowing it wont be right, but just doing it so I have something to hand it. I'm slowly coming to hate college, and I'm actually panicking about going back on Tuesday, whereas in the summer, I was counting down the days to going back :(
Post edited by JustV on

Comments

  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Do you have a personnal tutor or something like that, anyone other than the lecturer you could talk to at college to try and resolve some of the problems you've been having? That might help.

    I went to 6th form at school and then onto an academic uni course so don't have any experience of this kind of thing, but most colleges have someone other than the lecturer to try and resolve things.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    My tutor is one of my lecturers. I have tried talking to her, but she's the one who explained the mean/median/mode thing to me, and everytime I ask her, she's also the one that tells me "well book clients in then".

    It's making me noticeably down, and snappy, because my heads all over the place.

    My mum says that if something doesn't change, she's going in to speak to my tutor, but I don't know how much that'll help, because I'm 18 now, so according to the college, it's all effectively my responsibility, but my mum wont have that :rolleyes: She's convinced the world runs for her sometimes.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    If they are not listening to you, then having someone else put it to them might be a useful way to do it.

    I'm sure you're not, but try not to look for a row or be difficult, take the charming, 'I really want to do this but am struggling to find a way to make it work, what can we do to try and sort it out'.

    If your tutor is no use is there another one of the lecturers that might be more useful, or the co ordinator maybe?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    you need to speak to another lecturer then. - find one who will listen to you :yes:
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Yeah, I've found that you've got to keep trying until you find someone that will listen to you. I'm glad you're mature enough to go to people, because I never was until going to uni! Just don't give up, they are there for your benefit, so they should be doing all they can to help you.

    capo2
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Nikki* wrote:
    I struggle to see how I can use all the different averages to give a proper answer. I know how to do the averages fine, I really enjoyed statistics work in Maths at school, but I can't see where I can use them to give a reasonable answer to questions like "Have you ever used a sunbed? Yes = 5 No = 15" and so on.

    Would this not be something like:
    "Three quarters of people have never used a sunbed."
    "25% of people have used a sunbed at least once."
    "An average of X amount of people have never used a sunbed."

    Every time you quote a statistic, use a different type of numerical answer (fraction, percentage, average, etc). I don't know whether that's right but what I've found is that tutors are much more receptive to helping you when you try something out and get it wrong than when you go to them and say you don't know what to do. I guess it's because they don't want to end up doing the work for you, but if you've done some work and not done it quite right then they don't mind putting you right. I'd try that, ask your tutor if she can look over it and give you some input on where you could improve things, and see if she's any more helpful.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    wildchild wrote:
    Would this not be something like:
    "Three quarters of people have never used a sunbed."
    "25% of people have used a sunbed at least once."
    "An average of X amount of people have never used a sunbed."

    Yes, but I've got to use the mean median and mode versions of averages rather than just a general term, and I can't see how they apply to my questions. I haven't asked my tutor how to do it, I've asked her what she's looking for etc, so that I don't have to get it wrong.

    It's just all on my head at the minute, I'm actually feeling physically ill at the thought of going back on Tuesday, and seriously considering quitting. My mum's going to ring up on Tueday morning though (I'm not in til afternoon) and talk to my tutor, because it's affecting everything I do now, because I'm just so fed up and worked up.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Nikki* wrote:
    I haven't asked my tutor how to do it, I've asked her what she's looking for etc, so that I don't have to get it wrong.

    For some reason tutors don't seem to get this. Here's an example for you: I'm doing a history module at university this year but as I haven't done history since GCSE, I asked the tutor if he could give me some advice on the style so I don't get it wrong. He sent me the department handbook and said it would tell me how an essay should be structured. So I read the handbook and tried to write the essay how it wanted, but when I got it back it was marked down a lot because the style wasn't right. But on the mark sheet he wrote some tips about how I could gain more marks. All I wanted was those tips before I wrote the essay, but he wouldn't give them to me until I'd done it wrong already.

    I don't know why but that seems to be the way tutors work, so I really think the best thing you can do is put some mean median mode averages into your thing ("A mean of X amount of people have never used a sunbed, a mode of X amount of people have never used fake tan, a median of X amount of people have never had laser hair removal treatment"). Even if you think it's really stupid and bound to be wrong, at least you've got something to show your tutor and you might just get some tips out of it.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    wildchild wrote:
    Even if you think it's really stupid and bound to be wrong, at least you've got something to show your tutor and you might just get some tips out of it.

    And you've also shown that you've attempted something even if you do get it wrong.

    With the average, would you have to explain that it shows something? So you wouldn't just write X amount of people have used a sunbed.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Well, my mums rang up this morning, and we're going in at 2pm. But the first thing my tutor said was "Well, she's had a lot of crucial time off...."

    This really hacks me off. I had a week off admittedly, because I was really poorly. I even went back to college before I was supposed to, because I was worried about not handing my work in, and the first thing I was told upon walking through the door "You haven't handed your assignment in."

    I can't believe they're thinking of blaming my stress and worry on the fact that I had a week off because I was ill. Bedbound in fact, I was too weak to walk to the kitchen. So I couldn't help being off. I just get the impression that anything we say is going to be twisted into that I've had time off even though I couldn't help it.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    If they do bring up the time you had off, make it very clear to them that you were off on medical advice and there wasn't anything that you could do about it, and you've tried your utmost best since then to catch everything up.
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