Overreach…who me?
Perhaps…just perhaps… I might have overestimated my ability to handle 4 full time college courses AND work a full time job AND have some semblance of a life.
Business Calculus
Principals of Accounting I
World Literature
Composition II
Honestly, the World Lit and Comp class are going to be fun!
I mean really…my first reading assignment in World Lit is a story called “Nipple Jesus” and we were warned it might be considered offensive.
THAT IS AWESOME! ha..ha.ha…
Comp II is with the same instructor as Comp I last semester and she is great, so no worries there.
Business Calculus. Ugh… the FINAL math class I have to take before I can declare my degree program.
A necessary evil.
At least it is using the same system as my Algebra class last semester.
So I’m a step ahead already.
Principals of Accounting I.
I figured..hey…why not? I’ve been doing accounting for companies the last 12 years.
How hard can it be?
Oh my GAWD!!!
Just the first chapter and I’m already thinking I can’t handle it.
Oh sure, I’ve been using Quickbooks and Quicken for years, but the base mechanics behind all the numbers has never been explained to me.
I thought I had a good base understanding.
I was way wrong!
Doing this stuff by hand is a BEEYOTCH.
Not only that, it’s confusing as all hell.
I’m thinking this may be one of those classes I need to actually take in person and not online.
The instructor doesn’t have videos up like my math classes.
There was one. One video! And that actually helped me immensely.
But after that, I’m on my own.
I hate the idea of dropping the class. That reeks of failure to me.
But I’m trying to tell myself that it’s not failure, it’s simply accepting that I need a face-to-face class for this subject.
I’m going to give it another week or two and see how I do.
All I know is that I’ve spent more time on this class for the first assignment than any other EVER! (and I still missed a lot!)
…blargh….
I did well with the accounting 1 & 2 classes I took online, but then my teacher also had power point presentations & a couple of different books to refer to; there was a TON of reinforcing homework; plus Himself has a business degree with an accounting focus, & he does this kind of stuff for a living (not an accountant, but close …). There’s stuff that’s not the least bit intuitive (the concept of debits & credits is not AT ALL the same as colloquial use, and finally Himself looked at me when I was in mid-rant and said, “Even in college I never obsessed about credits and debits at 1 am on a Saturday morning. If you would just quit trying to make it make sense & just accept that one is a plus and goes on the right and one is a minus and goes on the left, you’ll be a lot happier). BTW, it’s been long enough since that class I forget which is a plus and which is a minus.
One thing that helped tremendously was excel spreadsheets. Once you know the formulas and set up the spreadsheets, it’s a ton easier to manage, and it starts to make a lot more sense — at least, it did in my case.
My classes allowed open book tests and quizzes which helped, too. It wasn’t so much that the answers were there. I still had to know what I was looking for and where; and it helped me remember the fine details in complicated procedures. I figured it made sense as well, because if I did this stuff professionally, constant experience would help me remember the stuff I did constantly, but I’d still end up looking up stuff I’d forgotten or needed to verify to make sure I did things right.
Best of luck, however you end up taking the classes.
I took a year of accounting and cost accounting at a traditional college many decades ago when I was working on a dual major. Engineering/business. I did the accounting work in an unusual way. The homework was due at the end of the semester. The exam was a single exam given at the end of the semester. If you wanted you could do the traditional method, turn in homework when it was assigned, and take spot exams if so desired or go for the big one at the end. I decided that I didnt want to work for a F. I had two other courses in my past where I busted nutz working to get it only to get a F. So I decided I work go to class, doodle on the work, and do it at the end. If I knew the stuff it would be a hard weekend and a week of doing homework or else if I didnt, no biggie, just dont turn anything in and get the F, but at least I didnt have to work my jimmies off to get that F. The prof took my pile o’paper and asked me about the strategy, was rather ammused at my reason and well, it worked for me. He did notice a definate gradual sloshing of numbers since I worked non-stop literally for 9 days doing non-stop accounting homework. So as time went on the writing deteriarated (just like this spelling) into a physicans scibble. So perhaps you just need to look at it a bit. You know you know it, its just now its by the book (the textbook) and thats a bit different for you.
It will come to you.
After finishing the Chapter 1 assignments and reading the text on Chapter 2 I admitted defeat. I can not handle the Accounting class this semester. I’m going to have to take the course on campus.
The good news is, today was the last day to drop a class and still get 100% refund. If I had waited until tomorrow, the refund goes to 50%.
Oh well. I still have Business Calculus to look forward to. *snort*
(there is also the fact that 4 classes made it nigh impossible to have any kind of social life because I was already studying all the freaking time and it was just the first week!)