Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

news.ycombinator.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 112 posts

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#61

Post by prepend »

spoiler wrote: post #52
prepend wrote: post #10

> Despite being a smart person, I've never been the kind of A type personality who does well at school. It’s hard to measure smart. Especially to measure myself. How do I know if I’m smart or stupid? Beats me. I’ve met people who think they are dumb and seem like a genius to me. And I’ve met people who wear “I’m a genius” and literally showed me a Mensa card and seemed very dumb to me. I’ve met lots of people claim t…

Agree with everything you said, but want to add something regarding the school systems worldwide: they're designed for the average kid. And I mean more than intellectually average. Just average in general, which inclides "neuro-typicality", or family situation, etc. So, depending on what makes the kid an an outlier, they might struggle in this system that wasn't designed for their needs.

Oh certainly. I think my point isn’t that a smart people do well in school, but it’s pointless to self describe as smart.

The best programmers I ever knew were terrible students. Like drop out at 6th grade terrible.

But in OP’s case, I think it’s reasonable for the school to set their standard for admitting to a CS program and then stick to it. I’m not sure how OP can prove if they would do well if they got in and really cared. As they knew the requirements and importance so if they cared enough they would perform at the minimum. Just saying “I’m smart and I swear I’ll start working hard if you let me in” will never be very successful for purposes of admitting people to a limited size program.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#63

Post by sph »

sitzkrieg wrote: post #51
sph wrote: post #40

> Despite being a smart person, I've never been the kind of A type personality who does well at school. The environment just doesn't suit me. That's a feature. The fact that we expect kids to wake up at 7am, sit and pay attention in silence for hours is mindbogglingly absurd. For a decade after leaving school, I had residual semi-PTSD after getting home from work, with the feeling that I had to study or prepare homew…

i thought your story sounded familiar so i checked and definitely remember klesh aha! i was actively working on a toy os around the same time and staying up all night on irc

Where did you hear about it? IIRC I mostly hung about on Italian-speaking IRC servers, and I must've mentioned it a couple times on the OSDev forums. I'm not sure, it's been almost 20 years now, and it's all lost in a haze of marijuana smoke :)

From that era I remember TriangleOS, SkyOS (with that fancy GUI) and Unununium (was it the Python OS? I only remember the Hans Reiser quote on the home page) It was such a buzzing scene.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#64

Post by cc101 »

Further comments. 1) I once got a count of comments on HN that reference adhd or ADHD. There were over a million. Your's is not an insurmountable problem.

2) While you can't compete head on with CS grads with excellent grades, you don't need to. Domain knowledge can be critical in this. If you are applying to a s/w house that specializes in medical s/w, a few classes in medical technology or managing a medical practice could be decisive. In such a case I wouldn't apply through a CS headhunter but through a headhunter that specializes in a medical field and who might have a client who needs your help.

Good luck!

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#65

Post by swayvil »

davidhariri wrote: post #41
AnotherGoodName wrote: post #39

Regardless of intelligence you clearly have the one thing that actually matters: Determination and resilience. Seriously. Study after study has shown that the thing that matters most is resilience. The ability to push forward saying "I AM CAPABLE!". https://medium.com/@ocarolinestokes/resilience-is-the-underl... You clearly have that. Keep pushing on. A counterpoint is that i have friends with PHDs who've never actua…

Resilience beats talent 100% of the time.

That's a theme you see in the old Zen cartoons.

It ain't talent or education. It's perseverance.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#66

Post by satisfice »

I’ve had a 40 year career in computing as a high school dropout.

I wrote this book about it, specifically to help folks like us: Secrets of a Buccaneer-Scholar, by James Marcus Bach.

I guess I have ADHD. But I can’t shake the feeling that it’s more a superpower than a disability. My son has been diagnosed with it at 29 and finds that Adderall helps a lot.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#67

Post by bradlys »

It happens but it’s not common for people in SV these days.

Most of the young people you’ll meet in SV are overachievers. This is because almost no one is willing to hire someone with a bad gpa, low tier school, or with meh projects/internships.

I’d be hesitant of taking advice from people with 20+ years experience because the market when they entered is drastically different than now. Even some folks with 10+ years (who don’t switch jobs often) might not know how dramatically important things like leetcode are.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#68

Post by satisfice »

dasil003 wrote: post #59
prepend wrote: post #10

> Despite being a smart person, I've never been the kind of A type personality who does well at school. It’s hard to measure smart. Especially to measure myself. How do I know if I’m smart or stupid? Beats me. I’ve met people who think they are dumb and seem like a genius to me. And I’ve met people who wear “I’m a genius” and literally showed me a Mensa card and seemed very dumb to me. I’ve met lots of people claim t…

Once when I was young I mentioned something about being smart. My dad asked, "what makes you think you are smart?" In my youthful arrogance I didn't have an answer, but the question stuck with me, especially in light of all the studies showing that praising kids for hard work increases performance, and praising them for intelligence suppresses it. The fact is: one should avoid even having an opinion on ones own intel…

If you are right, then wow, I must be even smarter than I think I am— considering all the suppression that must have happened from being told I am smart.

But I think it’s more likely that considering myself capable of solving problems is a good thing. It’s a trait called self-efficacy. Thank you, Mom, for getting me that subscription to Scientific American when I was nine.

Here’s where I might agree with you. In my youth I joined Mensa and Intertel, to try to hang out with the smartest people I could find. I can report that it is a poor heuristic for socializing. I came to the conclusion that a gathering of people filtered specifically for performance on intelligence tests results in conflict, not harmony.

As I aged and became a teacher, I found it is better to treat everyone as potentially brilliant, in some possibly undiscovered way; or at least as possessing qualities that may unlock the brilliance of others. We’re all valuable if we seek to be, and intelligence tests are beside the point of living.

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#69

Post by peterhi »

I was expected to get around 10 O Levels at school (a UK exam for 16 yo). I failed them all. The nearest thing to an academic achievement I have ever accomplished :) I stayed on for another 2 years just so I could get an O Level in basic English proficiency, the school was worried that I would be completely unemployable without it. You normally stayed the next 2 years to get A Levels (the advanced version of the O Levels)

Did a lot to temporary work and finally got a clerical job. Later the government opened the YOPS program (Youth Opportunities Program) and I went off to learn COBOL

Got a programming job with it and after a few years applied to go to University (at 29). Fortunately there was a drive to accept "mature" candidates (less qualified) and I was accepted to study Artificial Intelligence as an Arts Degree

Managed a 2ii (a 3 would be viewed as "didn't actually fail" but a 1 or 2i would have been a "good" result)

Went back to being a programmer

People genuinely thought that I would / could get 10 O Levels in the same year, I must have been smart enough to impress my teachers but it all fell apart when I sat down to do the exams

I think that I am at least intelligent but I get sidetracked (the amount of time I spent investigating prime numbers / golomb rulers when I was supposed to be learning calculus). It is still an issue. I have finally learnt everything that they tried to teach me at school (I'm 62 now) and a bunch more

However I was never told I was smart, only that I should try and that I was at least capable of achieving great things academically

I could have done more but that was all down to me and the effort I put forth

Re: Ask HN: Did Anyone Else Here Simply Not Do Well at School?

#70

Post by friend_and_foe »

I hated school. I resented doing homework. I learned the material, but I didn't do the work. I got 100% on a mathematics final for example but still failed the class because I didn't do the busy work.

I didn't go to college because I just couldn't stand it. I self taught basically everything I'm good at.

Keep in mind, these educational pipelines aren't just there to make sure you know the stuff. They're there to also see if you'll eat the shit you have to eat to make it in your field. Sometimes that's important. Doctors are committing to work long hours at the drop of a hat while people are screaming at them for the rest of their lives. But in other cases it's just hazing, it's just gatekeeping to keep pay up. I've never been much of a shit eater, which is why I'm not a doctor.

Post reply on HN