Eric CS Online Journal

Goal Setting Lecture topics this week include goal setting and mission statements.  My initial reaction to these topics was thinking they are 'corny'.  But it could be that I'm thinking that as a jaded 40-something working professional with half or more of my life behind me.  It is frustrating to think that goal setting could be very effective and that I've missed out of ~25 years of its benefit.   (This sounds like what I was reading earlier for the ethics paper, a motivational bias called  adverse thinking  where I have anxiety that not-p might be true.  I may be biased against goal setting because I secretly know it is effective and I'm in denial.) Educational Goals: Of course, one of my educational goals is to learn about software development.  To reach this goal, I am enrolled in the CSUMB CS Online program for Software Engineering to earn my bachelor's degree. In the past, I have also studied Japanese at different levels and intensity, ...

With our teams, we reviewed the CS online curriculum and provided summaries of the course contents as well as how it will benefit us.  The curriculum progresses as one would expect of a CS program.  I'm looking forward to getting into all of these courses.  One of the lecture materials "What a Computer Science Major Needs to Know" was a doozy of a read.  I've bookmarked several topics that I don't know much about or don't know about at all.  I know nothing about formal methods, cryptography or parallelism, for example.  I'm also inspired to instantiate a Unix VM and go over some of the points brought up.  Finally, I want to research what a 'theorem prover' is and how it relates to our coding style. In the writing course, we wrapped up our industry analysis paper.  I suspect I made several mistakes in the formatting of my APA references, which I found extremely frustrating to work with.  I did take a certain enjoyment from writing out the essa...

Effective Study Skills In examinations, I have struggled with planning and executing answers to longer-form essay questions.  Creating an outline off to the side is a good idea, one that I don't think I've done in exam environments. My ear for note taking can use some practice.  This semester, I am taking my notes in Google Keep as I watch and listen to lecture videos.  Usually I do not go back and revise them, but I will work on that as part of the SQ3R method.   I can admit to being a procrastinator when it comes to studying.  While I can make it through most exams without issue, long term retention and learning can be difficult.  With the good lessons we are receiving in Proseminar, I feel much more encouraged to manage my study time and coursework time throughout the week. Depending on the topic, I will sometimes go down useful tangents to related topics.  This can help me connect the dots and reinforce some of the topics.  After taking n...

It is exciting to finally arrive at this leg of my higher education journey.  The initial COVID shutdown was the catalyst for me to get back to pursuing my bachelor's degree - that and reaching a dead-end in the promotion track with my current employer.  More than 20 years ago my first major was Computer Science and now I'm picking up where I left off.  There have been so many advancements since then; I hope my early experience and the time between are useful during my time at CSUMB.