When I graduated from college, I thought, "There's no way I'm going to grad school unless there's basically a 100% reason I need to have that advanced education." While for many years, I thought I would never go back to real "school," the time has come. A growing interest in all things electric, especially radios, and having never heard back from numerous applications to SpaceX, Boeing, and other engineering companies, I figured it was time realizing the answer to "Who takes a chance on a guy who's 15 years out of engineering school, but hasn't really worked as an engineer?" It turns out: No one.
So back to school I go to become a "double E" as an electrical engineer, to reopen or open new doors to space, the undersea world or Antarctica. That's the plan anyway.
But grad school in electrical engineering has been anything but easy. Considering I do not have an undergraduate degree in EE, I have a long long way to go. With classmates who are younger and working EEs, I have even farther to go compared to the rest of the bunch. I am doing an online program so I can continue my teaching career. Needless to say, I am the only teacher among the 2 prerequisite classes I took last year and the 3 grad-level classes I am currently taking.
So far, the pace has been grueling. I'm taking three classes now, in hopes of finishing my degree right as the next NASA astronaut application opens. Three classes is a lot, even when I have the summer mostly off. I spend anywhere from 6 to 12 hours a day, everyday, going through the books, the posted lectures, the assignments.
Generally I work 8 am to 4 or 5, then blow off some steam, then back at it after dinner. It's exhausting and is relentless in that if I don't get on each new module right away, it's so easy to slip behind. Every half hour of my summer is accounted for, meaning basically that if I'm not studying, it's got to be worth it. The things that are worth it are sleep, swimming, exercise and good friends and family. I had plans to travel and study, of friends to visit, but those were thrown out the window. The thee syllabuses combined said the three classes should be about 25 to 48 hours per week. Being a slower worker, I'm definitely on the slower end of that so that sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the week.
No big land, sea or sky adventure for me this summer, my adventure is of the mind. Sometimes, I just laugh when I look at what I'm learning, and then think that I'm in electrical engineering graduate school. And I often think, "If I can pull this off, it'll be incredible...one of my biggest accomplishments ever!" But it's a big if!
In the beginning I was fraught with the feeling that I am not smart enough for this kind of thing. It was as if a voice was inside my head saying, "You'll never be able to handle all this, you're not smart enough! You'll put in all this time, energy and effort, and you still won't make it!" Over and over again. It was a struggle to not listen to that voice, to not believe it.
To get through, I borrowed something from a Navy SEAL friend. When I asked him how he got through "Hell Week" of BUD/S (Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL Training), he said something to the effect of, "The only time I would allow myself to quit was at a meal. If I was at a meal, it meant the exercise was over, I had made it through, and I was more likely to be ready for the next challenge, with food in my stomach." I adapted this to, I can only quit after my homework is turned in. It meant that I couldn't even entertain the thought, and so I would just keep plugging away and little by little, I would make progress!
I've now two thirds of the way through the semester and have passing grades in all my classes! (Communications System Engineering, Digital Signal Processing, and Microwave Systems and Receiver Design) I wish I could say with confidence that I'm going to pass them all, but I'm going to have to work for it. Only one grade out of my 10 classes can be in the C range, so I don't want to take my C in the first three lower-level classes. I do really like what I'm learning, especially when I fully understand a topic. Then I think of all the interesting things I can do with it: Space communications, antarctic communications, underwater communications and systems.
It's been a humbling experience though. Again and again, I have to write on the discussion board that I don't understand a certain topic. I have to schedule one-on-one skype-like meetings with the professors for extra help. In the class last semester, I was the only student who needed the scheduled "office hours" and one professor even commented, "I've never had a teacher in one my classes before."
Little by little though, I'm surviving, one homework, or I suppose, three homeworks at a time. The voices are quieter in my head as I've proved to them, that I can at least get through the material and get my grades above the 80 mark, some even far higher! As I learn about filter design, I'm learning how to filter out the internal messages, trying to let the good, supportive ones pass, while attenuating those that do not help. I've become more aware of those voices and have learned to recognize them before listening to them, so that I can try to chose to listen to them or not.
And I've learned to ask for lots of help - from classmates and teachers. I've got to keep reaching out for help. It requires letting go of the feeling that I should know something that I don't, but I've been finding it's often the only way through. Juggling three classes, my brain often turns to mush, but little by little, homework by homework. If I don't make it, it won't be because I quit. Maybe it's true - that I'm not smart enough, but I'm committed to that not being my decision, I'll just keep doing the best I can, and hope that my determination can close the gap.
That's all for now. Got to start the week of study, where every minute counts.
