Exam results
18 July 2003 14:15![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
denPassed User Interface Design
Failed Java (again)
Have to resit the Online Multimedia exam in August. (Marginal fail)
I can't believe I got an AE on Online Multimedia! I thought I did okay in that, apart from not being able to work out the MB size of a video given the time and sample-rate. A 30 minute video at 250bps... My answer, "Too large for on-line multimedia. Put it on a CD", was the wrong answer.
It appears that this degree in Information Technology doesn't have a lot of stuff that applies to Real World IT. Their basic assumption in Online Multimedia is that every home has a fibre optic pipe into it, and all my effors to create small-MB web pages* and graphics leads to a lowering of my marks. In one assignment I had to write a paragraph about the hardware required. My system was going to require a keyboard, mouse, monitor and printer. I had to write a paragraph for each device.
Write a 50+ word paragraph about a standard mouse. Make it interesting. I lost marks on that.
At a recent job interview (which I can't talk about due to the nature of the company) the boss asked me "Are they teaching you anything relevent to the IT industry as it stands now?"
I had to answer "No."
In the past every employer didn't care that I've worked with computers since 1985. They were concerned that I didn't have that bloody peice of paper called a "degree." So I'm going for the degree and it is irrelevent to the industry that wants me to get it.
*www.fleetwash.com.au has a total HDD footprint of 1.7MB
Failed Java (again)
Have to resit the Online Multimedia exam in August. (Marginal fail)
I can't believe I got an AE on Online Multimedia! I thought I did okay in that, apart from not being able to work out the MB size of a video given the time and sample-rate. A 30 minute video at 250bps... My answer, "Too large for on-line multimedia. Put it on a CD", was the wrong answer.
It appears that this degree in Information Technology doesn't have a lot of stuff that applies to Real World IT. Their basic assumption in Online Multimedia is that every home has a fibre optic pipe into it, and all my effors to create small-MB web pages* and graphics leads to a lowering of my marks. In one assignment I had to write a paragraph about the hardware required. My system was going to require a keyboard, mouse, monitor and printer. I had to write a paragraph for each device.
Write a 50+ word paragraph about a standard mouse. Make it interesting. I lost marks on that.
At a recent job interview (which I can't talk about due to the nature of the company) the boss asked me "Are they teaching you anything relevent to the IT industry as it stands now?"
I had to answer "No."
In the past every employer didn't care that I've worked with computers since 1985. They were concerned that I didn't have that bloody peice of paper called a "degree." So I'm going for the degree and it is irrelevent to the industry that wants me to get it.
*www.fleetwash.com.au has a total HDD footprint of 1.7MB
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University Curriculi
Date: 18 Jul 2003 08:16 (UTC)After working as a senior technical writer for many "Fortune 100" companies, including Hitachi, IBM, and Synoptics, I had to challenge the "basic computer literacy" requirement when I returned to University. I got in an argument with the instructor over a question of what path was the most common way for viri to infect a PC. He actually said "floppy disks that are shared." *Buzzer* Thanks for playing. I made the argument for modems (this was before DSL and other high-speed connections were widely available, but floppies were already falling into disuse in favor of commercially copied CDs) and gave him an ANSII report that said so. He was actually dumbfounded.
The problem is that by the time you are taught what they try to teach you, it could be 10 years old, and the professor out of the technical profession for even longer!