Done With the GRE, Finally

For months I’ve been studying for the Graduate Record Examination, or GRE. If you’ve followed along with the blogs, you know that it has taken up a large chunk of my time, and has only added to aggravation while living in a new country. Finally, on Saturday morning, I woke up early and headed in to take the test.

It felt kind of weird walking down the same streets I walk every day, except that they were totally empty. At 7:30 am on a Saturday, not a soul is found in the Microcentro. Tumbleweed city. Getting to the test center I saw two other girls waiting who would be in my computer lab. One was from Uruguay and was taking some banking exam, and the other was taking the GRE. Suddenly a group of about 8 high school age kids came in with their parents, all very excited. The kids were rushed into another room while the parents stood around looking happy and proud. My name was called and I entered the computer lab, filled out a form, and was placed at a computer to go to work.

It seems like a quarter of the test was just a tutorial on how to answer the questions, so by the time I finally got under way I was already tired and lost any unease I might have had. The advantage of doing nerve-wracking things in the morning is that you’re too tired to care, so aside from a little armpit sweat, you don’t get too worked up. In my case anyway. A short breath here and there, but all things considered I was as ready for this stupid test as I ever would be.

They say as time gets closer to the exam date you are supposed to wind down the studying. I started months ago—technically over a year ago—but as enthusiastic as I started out (I will do well on this exam!) by the last month or so I could handle it no more (Just end this crap already!). Using my lunch breaks and time after work for studying, it simply wore me out. You really can’t study for this exam for too long, or you just lose interest. It’s not as if you are studying an interesting topic, but you are merely studying to take a specific test.

Also consider that I’m terrible at math and had to dedicate time to reviewing topics I hadn’t thought of in years, and had lost any potential skill at long ago. Wasting my time reviewing this material when I could have been working on improving my Spanish or making some friends just ticked me off. But finally the day was there to face it and get it over with. The exam went about as I’d expected. I wrote the essays pretty well, in my opinion. I scored a bit above average on the verbal section, and the bottom fell out on the math and that’s where the score dropped.

It kind of bummed me out for a couple of hours, but then I realized that it’s finally over, and I don’t have to deal with it anymore. No more carrying around the big purple prep book to and from work. No more guilty feelings about using a Saturday to go somewhere rather than studying. And at long last, maybe I can finally start enjoying the time I have down here.

I got it kick started yesterday. I went with my friend Dan to a bar to watch the Pats game. It was the middle of the afternoon on a beautiful Sunday, but we were drinking in a bar, talking it up with a guy from Quincy, MA and his friend from New Hampshire. Their accents gave it away immediately and it reminded me of home. Drinking on a Sunday and football, chattin’ it up with some guys from New England. Not a bad way to celebrate no more GREing.

Has Technology Ruined Us (Me)? or: Damn Math Part 1

In the 10th grade I started getting math tutors when it became obvious that I sucked at equations. I was fine in other areas like English, history, etc. But math just continued to get harder and harder, and I wasn’t improving. Initially, I was pretty good at math, and I even got a 100 on a test in the 2^nd grade (still proud of it). Once we hit division, however, it was a downward spiral. I hated the fact that I had to have classes after classes, and I resisted with all of my power.

Ms. Van Dyke would come for an hour a week at 7 pm, and being a brat, I’d hardly show interest. Once I even heard her tell my mom that she knew I didn’t want the lessons and resented her. The same kind of thing went on throughout high school with two other tutors, though I was trying to at least understand the math as time went on, at least to improve my grades. Even with strict determination, an extra hour a week wasn’t enough to truly help me understand the material, maybe just finish my homework with some assistance.

Then as a senior, my friendly teacher Mrs. Goodman, who did her best to just pass me through, warned me that I should avoid taking math in college. It was pretty clear what she was saying: You suck at math and numbers should have a restraining order against you, do not go within 100 feet of a protractor. One math course my first semester in college and I was done, finished forever. All of the nonsensical equations I had learned throughout my youth floated out of my head, and any time I needed to do some dreaded math, I trusted the calculator or a smarter friend.

That is until recently, when I had to delve back into my arch enemy’s territory for the GRE. It seems so unfair that I should be tested on material I haven’t looked at in 5 years, especially when it will have NOTHING to do with what I want to study a Masters degree in. It’s just not right, and the grades on the prep book tests show that any lingering memories of algebraic basic knowledge have long since left with so many other brain cells that I parted ways with in college. But a friend who used to teach math at Sylvan Learning Centers in the U.S. for a few years offered to help last night.

We spent a little over an hour going through problems and brushing up on basic math skills. Though they were still a bit beyond reach, I could remember having done these things at some point, and as the hour went on it made more sense. But there was still that fog in my brain, the kind you have when thinking of a dream the next morning. It was hard enough to focus with a math tutor in high school after being out of class for a few hours, but this lesson was after a long day at work, well after exhaustion set in.

This time I really wanted to focus, and I strained my brain to understand it. But my eyes went out of focus and started thinking about how I would eventually write about this. (Damn you, literary mind!). Much for the same reason I simply understand the way a sentence should sound, or if a word should be cut, my friend Justin can do complex math problems with ease. He’s got a right brain, I’ve got a left. But there’s no section on the GRE for writing creatively. I guess individual skill, rather than generic, isn't that important to the folks at ETS (administrators of the GRE).

But I wonder what would have happened if I didn’t rely on my calculator. If I actually had to retain some of the math skills learned way back in the day. Would life be simpler or more difficult? Short run—more difficult, long run—simpler, I think. I just don’t have the time to relearn all of these equations or theorems. 

To Be Continued...Right Now

Above: Photo by NintendoChick

All Study and No Play Makes Jon a Dull Boy

I am a tired man. I'm working long hours and filling in the gaps with grad school applications and studying for the GRE. It's really too much to be taking on at one time, and if I were a wiser man I would have studied for the GRE when I worked 20 hours a week in Ecuador, taken the exam when I was home in the states, and applied for grad schools before I had a job. Well, I'm an idiot. You live and you learn, but hopefully you only need to suffer through this experience once.

Filling out all of the application materials for a grad school is painful, and it's as bad as you can imagine when you are applying to eight of them. They are all online now, and some of them even use the same "standard" application system. Yet though they are online and using the same systems, you still have to plug in the same information every time, which defeats the purpose. All of these personal statements are basically the same but questioned just a little bit differently so that you have to write them all over again, and edit them all over again just the same.

Obviously this hard work should go towards something, should really show that if you're willing to fill all of this junk out and take the GRE that you are serious about studying for a Masters. But it's not enough to get you in. It's just so draining that it really gives me respect for those who work full time jobs and then study at night school. I don't know how you could find the focus to sit in a class after working all day, let alone find the time to study, eat, do laundry, figure out bills, and try to have some semblance of a normal life. The hope would be that it will all pay off in the end. If it does.

I walk out of the office now and instead of going home with a skip in my step like every day is Friday before vacation, I'm simply drudging along to get home, change, and start studying again or filling out more applications. I eat a quick and usually unimaginative dinner of pasta because it's easy and quick to cook, and then it's back to the books. I feel guilty if I quit for a half hour before bed to unwind with some TV. This won't go on forever, and once I take the GRE in Buenos Aires on December 12th I can breath. Once all of the applications have been turned in by January (one in April) I can actually rest and start enjoying myself fully (with any luck).

My time here is going by quickly so far, mainly because I am so busy. I didn't intend to come down here and throw everything on the table like I have done, but it just kind of happened. It prevents me from doing more enjoyable during the week and makes me feel guilty on the weekend if I'm not making the most of every minute, but I have to believe that it will pay off in the end. Otherwise, it's been a good waste of time.