Reflections on Year 1 of my engineering studies

I've finally completed the first year (of three) of my Bachelor's degree in Engineering at IU Hochschule. Technically speaking, it's my second first year, since I quit school some years ago.

Some background:

• It's a general engineering degree. There are electives for various specializations in the final year, but to the best of my knowledge, the degree you get is a B.Eng.
• It's a three-year program full-time, but flexible if you want to do part-time. You can spread it out over 4 or 6 years, or even longer. It took me just under a year to complete the first full-time year, but I expect the next two years will go slower, as there's more content, and most of it is new to me.
• I chose to study Engineering, not Computer Science, because I already work as a software professional. CS would fill some gaps in my knowledge, but mostly in a theoretical way. There'll be some learnings, but I don't think it's worth a multiyear program. Plus, engineering still fascinates me.
• It's entirely online, including exams. This has pros and cons, some of which I'll discuss.

General thoughts

• School still sucks. Like many other things in life, it's a broken system. Curriculum. Course materials. Lecturers. Exams. The system will favour some people and not others. It rewards conformity.
• School is awesome. Formal education is a great concept. My entire programming journey has been informal (I'd say "self-taught", but we all learnt from the works of others). It's great to have a curriculum, that structures things and tells you where to go next. It relieves you of a huge burden.

Things I've (re-)learnt:

• Focus on the journey. This came after working hard on some courses but ultimately having a less-than-stellar score on the exam. I have the privilege of not needing this to get a job. It means I can afford not to worry too much about grades. Instead, I want to optimize for learning as much as I can, even if my grades suffer. It seems obvious, but it's hard for me as a completionist and a perfectionist. This has meant:
  • intentionally skipping some sections of a textbook because I saw no use in them except for passing an exam
  • not being stressed out about memorising random things like dates, which have no bearing on my actual skill as an engineer
  • finding extra materials and challenges that go well beyond the course content, even when they prolong the length of the course
• Learning takes time. In the first several months, my priority was "progression": finishing one course ASAP and moving to the next. But I ultimately realized that learning takes time, and there's no way to short-circuit it. Sometimes, just doing nothing after studying helps you learn better than moving directly to the next thing.
• Progress is not linear. Another thing that's deeply personal to me, who gets easily frustrated if there are no signs of progress. I have to accept that I will forget things, I won't understand everything, I will need to go look up old courses, I will jump back and forth, and that's okay.
• Continuous tweaking. At first, I was worried I didn't know how to study since I get easily distracted. Over time I've found that I can do whatever works, rather than trying to find the optimal process. I've tried different things and made a note of what works in what situation. And I feel free to adjust it if it isn't working. Some things I've tried:
  • studying seated/standing/lying down
  • studying outside/in a restaurant/in a park/at a bus stop/on a train
  • studying with no music/chill music/fun music (this one does NOT work)
  • studying in bursts/for long periods
  • studying via a printed textbook/phone/tablet/desktop
  • writing notes by hand/typing
• Others can help: I'm super independent and love "figuring it out", so it took effort to learn to ask for help. But it's worth it. I've gotten help and learnt useful techniques from my classmates. It's always illuminating to see how others approach things.
• I can help others. In the same vein, I've tried to help my classmates when I can, explaining concepts, giving directions, or providing tips. I even became a de facto class representative when we needed to complain to the school administration.

Things I've enjoyed

• Learning. Learning is so cool. Especially when it's getting to know something you didn't before that explains how some other thing you were aware of works. Human beings have made so many awesome things.
• Connecting dots. Even better, I've enjoyed seeing my knowledge compound. One delightful experience for me was visiting a technology museum while studying a course on Automation Technology, which got me through a rut I was stuck in. And every time I find myself able to understand a course by building on things I learnt from another course feels like a lightbulb going off in my head. These moments make me feel more confident in the curriculum.
• Inspiration and experimentation. I love how really studying a course sometimes inspires me to build or try something. For instance, my Linear Algebra course inspired me to make the vector graphing library I used in this post and this post. My IoT course showed me some of the real benefits of smart devices, and I have a bunch of ideas written down to try sometime. My Production Engineering course has me itching to try 3D printing.

Things I wish were better

• Classroom environment. I still wish I could be in a classroom (I get this urge a lot when watching lecture videos from MIT's OpenCourseWare). I miss having more free time and being surrounded by smart, motivated folks with similar goals. But, truth be told: I'm romanticizing it a bit. I'd bet half of my class back in my first program didn't know what the hell they were doing. Plus, most of us didn't maximize the opportunity. We were young and foolish. Oh, and being in a classroom sounds cool now, but actually having to be in one for several hours a day is not.
• Labs. The program is online-only, but obviously you can't become an engineer by reading alone. There has to be some practice. Thus far, everything we've done has been theoretical, but I think there's a provision for "simulations" in Year 2 or 3. Still, I think the course materials have done a poor job of encouraging a hands-on approach. They've seemed like "theory dumps", with the occasional picture or text case study. I would like if they included suggested practical exercises at least. I've had to give myself such exercises, but I just do it for things that pique my curiosity.
• Exams. The program unfortunately has only one final exam, which can range in difficulty from "lol, that was too easy" to "what the fuck." It's an unfair system (although you can retry if you fail). I picked up a habit from a classmate of making up midterm exams for myself.
• The curriculum. There's been some useless stuff, both for me personally and for the overall program. Some courses are mandatory for everyone but focus on niche stuff that people in those industries will be specially trained in. Some courses are merely "memorize-and-dump". I'm mostly lucky, though; my interests are in electronics, and I think our program is biased towards that.

Overall I'm happy. I think the next semester is going to be pretty tough. I'm quite excited about the upcoming Control Engineering course, but less enthused about the three Mechanics/Materials courses. For now, I hope to take things a bit slow by experimenting with some interesting learnings from Signals and Systems, and perhaps doing a boring nontechnical course. (Update: I decided to step back and work on some small projects for each of my courses, to help solidify my knowledge.)

Most importantly, I'm grateful. Years ago when I quit school, I worried that my mental health would prevent me from holding a full-time job. And when I started up school again, I was scared I couldn't do it. Yet here I am, job in hand, and one year of school down. Grateful.