Lately I’ve been feeling: 1. Stressed and 2. Inadequate. If you can’t handle or don’t like pity parties, please read no further. However, I know I’m not alone because God sent me a little angel last week at work who (didn’t know it), but made me feel like 100 times better about my school life.
Many of you don’t know the struggle of taking a Macroeconomics class online. I hate math. I hate formulas. I hate graphs. I hate words I don’t understand (autonomous, inflationary, expansionary…etc.). Put all this hatred together and you get Macroeconomics.
I have spent hours upon hours watching lectures and studying for exams and quizzes in this class and somehow I still have come up short. I took this class about three semesters ago and dropped it because it was way too much to handle.
Being the intelligent young woman I am, I decided now was the time to try and retake the class, in half the amount of time (not a semester, 16-ish weeks, but 6 weeks). Worst. Mistake. Ever. It would make this class a little more bearable if I had a study group to vent to and bounce ideas off of. If I surrounded myself with people who were going through the same thing. It sucks not having anyone know the fight you’re putting up, just for this single class.
While I was at work last week a girl came in and bought some clothes and as I was ringing her out we started talking about school. Little did we know, we were both on our last leg of each class. For me, it’s Macroeconomics, for her it's Physics. We both dropped the classes before, we both are taking our classes now, and we both are in our senior year. To top it off, we are both doing horribly in our class.
As unfortunate as that sounds it was just the relief I needed. It was the understanding and the companionship I needed to get me through. I know I’m not the only one hanging on to my senior year by a thread. I know I’m not the only one who’s had to retake a class in college. And knowing that took a weight off my shoulders.
I’m writing this to not just invite everyone to join in my pity party, but to show those of you reading, if you are struggling in school right now, YOU ARE NOT ALONE! As an online student, we don’t have that group of people to surround ourselves with to lift us up out of the depths of failure. We don’t have people around to lean on or to learn from.
Just know you are not alone. Even students on campus have the same feelings. You don’t know the grade that everyone receives, you don’t know if half the class is failing, just like you are.
While it’s not okay to fail and I’m not condoning it, it’s okay to be a little relieved when you know you’re not the only one. It brings a sense of community and makes you not feel unintelligent or inadequate. That girl who came into my store to buy clothes had no idea the impact she had on my day.
While our schools are hundreds of miles away from each other (she goes to Old Dominion University) and our classes completely different (Physics and Macroeconomics), to know that we are both retaking a class that we previously dropped and are still barely passing (if that) was a godsend. It was what I needed. Maybe you needed this reassurance too. You are not the only person in your class doing poorly. You are not alone.
