Hopefully this doesn't come off the wrong way but was he international? Maybe it's a cultural thing. Anyway, that's crazy. I can't believe anyone would do that.
Last edited:
OT: Career advice
- Thread starter Vinny DeAngelo
- Start date
-
Xenforo Cloud will be upgrading us to version 2.3.5 on March 3rd at 12 AM GMT. This version has increased stability and fixes several bugs. We expect downtime for the duration of the update. The admin team will continue to work on existing issues, templates and upgrade all necessary available addons to minimize impact of this new version. Click Here for Updates
- Status
Hopefully this doesn't come off the wrong way but was he international? Maybe it's a cultural thing. Anyway, that's crazy. I can't believe anyone would do that.
I think it's interesting that you rag on state schools. Some state schools are amazing though. UC Berkley, University of Michigan, and University of Virginia are all state schools (unless you're talking about something else) and are all amazing.
BTW, I wouldn't worry about Sikorsky, my friend who is great at interviewing and has great aviation experience didn't get a job at Sikorsky either.
No, the candidate was not international in the least.
I've been on the hiring side of interviewing for about a year and a half now...I've never experienced something like that.
Developer lead and I were IMing through it, not believing what we were hearing.
Yeah, I'm not sure what the dig at a state school is all about. Sometimes state schools are actually tougher because they are under no pressure to ensure everyone graduates with a 3.8 or higher and ends up in the best jobs out there.
The biggest drawback is that the alumni base usually isn't as strong and the school name doesn't carry as much weight.
You ever watch Frasier? There's an episode where some guy calls in Frasier's radio show who is terrified of speaking in public so he just wrote out his part and stock answers to stock questions. You can clearly hear he's reading. Then Frasier asks "what if someone asks you a question you didn't anticipate?" Then you hear the guy rustling papers and getting frustrated because he can't find that question in his notes.
Vinny DeAngelo
Jimmy Easy to defend
Hey guys another update:
I just graduated from Florida state last Saturday. still no leads on jobs. since this thread was started ive learned how to code in: STATA, R, SAS, and SQL.
Stata was mainly for class work
R was to run fancy hockey stats stuff
SAS and SQL just kinda beefing up the resume.
As i continue my job search ive really enjoyed learning coding languages so i was wondering if there were any programmers on here who could tell me which language to learn next. Im currently trying to decide between Python and Java.
Thanks again for all the help guys!
I just graduated from Florida state last Saturday. still no leads on jobs. since this thread was started ive learned how to code in: STATA, R, SAS, and SQL.
Stata was mainly for class work
R was to run fancy hockey stats stuff
SAS and SQL just kinda beefing up the resume.
As i continue my job search ive really enjoyed learning coding languages so i was wondering if there were any programmers on here who could tell me which language to learn next. Im currently trying to decide between Python and Java.
Thanks again for all the help guys!
silverfish
got perma'd
Start picking up some of the slack in the Advanced Stats thread, bum
Start pushing all your code to GitHub so you have a portfolio you can show potential employers.
Crease
Chief Justice of the HFNYR Court
- Jul 12, 2004
- 24,767
- 27,709
As a first-year associate, the research assignments that trickle down to me are often the partner's last ditch effort to find supporting authority for some argument the partner wants to make. Basically, I am the firm's bearer of bad news.
Hunter Gathers
The Crown
This is not something I miss at all.
"WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU DIDN'T FIND THAT ONE PIECE OF SUPPORTING LAW THAT I THOUGHT MIGHT EXIST IN THE ENTIRETY OF US CASELAW!?!?"
Mac n Gs
Drury plz
- Jan 17, 2014
- 22,835
- 13,558
If you like medicine/science, look into bioinformatics. Jobs are always hiring and need analysts who have coding skills
Crease
Chief Justice of the HFNYR Court
- Jul 12, 2004
- 24,767
- 27,709
"Crease, I need you to find me Utah case law standing for the proposition that up means down. Don't spend more than one hour. Also, where are you on the 2+2=5 thing?"
If you have any apple product it can never hurt to learn objective C. Download xcode if you have a mac. IIRC registering with apple as a developer is free until you actually have something you want to list on the app store (may have to pay a registration fee if you want to have an ios app just on your own device).
Kane One
Registered User
Java. Master the object-oriented programming principles of Java and then you will have absolutely no problem learning any other language you want.
I agree. It's also more common than Python which will increase the number of opportunities available.
Also, Javascript is a very good language to learn. It's easy to pickup, but very difficult to master. It's becoming very Java-like in it's ability to run just about anywhere.
Why not both? I think starting off, Python is easier to start off for a programming language (assignment statements, Memory model, nested calls, function reuse, loops, etc.). You can still learn inheritance and OOPs in python as well. I just think the code is cleaner to understand for a beginner.
Java is better for OOP, as mentioned and definitely more applicable to real life. The experience from Python will certainly help any other programming language you're going to learn.
It depends on what you want entirely. If you're looking into Machine Learning perhaps, start off with Python. There are already plenty of models like AutoGrad that can get you started. It seems you already have a Stats background with R and SAS, so that's a good start.
This thread as well as the advanced stats thread makes me feel so so dumb.
BTW, I just recently got a job and am moving to Philly for it. It's a project manager job. Never did the work before nor studied it, should be interesting.
BTW, I just recently got a job and am moving to Philly for it. It's a project manager job. Never did the work before nor studied it, should be interesting.
Vinny DeAngelo
Jimmy Easy to defend
Thanks for the help again!
I decided to do python since it's generally viewed as easier to learn. I was trying to avoid a trial by fire situation. So with that said I'm still working on some basics and I know there is a ton of info out there, but does anyone have any ideas for beginner projects. Or has some work that needs to be done that maybe I can help with. I'm just spit balling here. Lol
I decided to do python since it's generally viewed as easier to learn. I was trying to avoid a trial by fire situation. So with that said I'm still working on some basics and I know there is a ton of info out there, but does anyone have any ideas for beginner projects. Or has some work that needs to be done that maybe I can help with. I'm just spit balling here. Lol
Kane One
Registered User
Things that are easier to learn tend to cause you to not follow best practices because once you think you can make whatever you want, you'll probably stop reading the tutorial book. I strongly suggest learning Java or C# first, because it's harder to learn, and once you really understand OOP, you can easily transfer your knowledge to Python.
Now for beginner projects, do you have any knowledge of SQL or HTML and CSS?
A classic example of a beginner project is an ATM machine. If you're a super beginner, just make a console app to allow users to deposit, withdraw, and view their balance. If you don't have experience with SQL, for now learn how to save their account info. For now you could just save the data to a text file. When the app starts, check if the file exists, and if it does, read the file with their account info. If the file doesn't exist, assume it's a new account, and have them create the account (maybe just their name, a PIN, and 0.00 as their starting balance).
After you learn how to read and write files, learn how to serialize objects. This is a more correct way to do something like this. If you're using Python, there is a module called Pickle you could use. If you decide to go with Java, there is an interface called Serializable.
After you do that and assuming you don't know SQL, stop what you're doing and spend a few days just focusing on SQL, probably just go with MySQL because it's free and widely popular. Then scrap the serialization idea and now save your data to the database. Now allow there to be multiple bank accounts, and maybe decide to keep a log of every transaction for each account.
Assuming you don't know anything about web development, learn HTML, CSS, and maybe sometime in the future learn Javascript. Right now just skip Javascript to make your life easier and turn this project into a website.
Now learn Javascript if you want to make the user experience much better.
Last edited:
I think best bet may be to participate in stuff like Hackathons... It's a way to network and learn on the fly.
ponytrekker
Registered User
- Mar 28, 2013
- 1,316
- 293
I agree with you on number 1. Disagree on 2.
I was taking the scenic route through college. I changed majors a few times, and as a result knew I would need a 5th year after 2 years. During my 4th year, I was living at home and things were not smooth with my parents. I was 21-22 and I was willing to let it be known when I was annoyed. For example, in the spring, I worked a 10-hour shift on fridays lifeguarding. One Friday, came home around 4:30 and as soon as I walked in the door, I heard my mother say, "Oh, patrick's home. I'll send him." I forget what she wanted me to do, but I just didn't want to do it. That summer, I was registered and it got bad to the point where I moved out. Got a job as a cold caller in a chop shop (stocks). After about a year, I hated it, got a job at a discount brokerage handling trade disputes. This was the fall of 99. Market was busy busy busy. By March 2001, it was dead. For the first year and a half I was making tons of money on OT, had a nice overnight differential, then OT dried up and it was awful. On top of that, there was a hiring freeze. We lost 3 guys in my department of about 10 (they left, not fired) and we were not allowed to replace them. Couldn't even accept a transfer from another department. So, I saw the writing on the wall and headed back to school to finish. Got laid-off Nov 2001, collected unemployment for a year while I finished and graduated Dec 2002. Was a finance major and tried like hell to get back into something wall st related. All I was getting was sales jobs and I didn't want it. Got a job at a bank, (more on that in point 2), lost job at bank. A woman with whom I played cards was a principal in Brooklyn. Asked me if I wanted to try teaching. This was May 2003. Couldn't get the credentials I needed in time to start immediately, but was able to get a temp license for September. Started (not her school) and been doing so ever since. For the first year I thought it was a temp thing and I kept looking for finance jobs. Eventually gave up and said screw it, just going to teach. Fast forward almost 14 years later. My friends who did get into finance, all but 1 are just miserable. They make more money than I do, but wish they could get out. They are at the point where they feel stuck. Too young to retire, but too old (we are all 40-41) to try and break into something new. One guy quit, started his own business and 2 years later was nearly broke. Don't get me wrong, I make good money. I work after-school center and get paid extra, I take extra classes which gets me paid extra, I work a program in the summer, and up until last year was reffing football and umpiring baseball and softball. Point is, took me a long time to get over not getting back into finance/wall street. In the back off my mind I kept saying that I knew I could be making more money doing something like that, but at 30-32 was not looking to start from the bottom again. Real problem when i graduated college (I was 26 at this point) was that most companies viewed my experience as Customer Service, but I was not looking to do that again. My view was I did not spend all that money and time finishing school just to do what I was doing beforehand. So, while I might have been able to make more money, looking back on it, I am glad I made the switch (or was forced to switch) and glad I was never able to get into finance.
On point 2, I will disagree and the bank I mentioned earlier is why. January 2003, landed an interview with a Bank. They were expanding all over the NY Metro area. I go in for a general interview and get offered a position as a Customer Service Rep at a branch. I took it thinking it would be "a foot in the door" and I could work my way up. Well, wrong. I had asked someone in HR, with whom I had dealt as I started, about a credit analyst position. A guy in my training class was in it, and his dad was the head of HR. Gave me his dad's contact info and we spoke. Said I was on his list for the next class (in about 6 months). For that position, they would hire people about 10 at a time every 6 months or so. Well, my would-be branch manager found out and I was let go. Said I wasn't "committed to my role as a CSR or to the success of her branch." Funny thing is, when I was interviewed I made it clear that I did not go back and finish school just to make ATM cards and open checking accounts for people. About 6 months after I was fired, ran into a guy who worked at the branch I was supposed to work. He transferred because the manager who canned me was nuts, and she was eventually fired herself. Point is, if I had waited. Apparently, at this company, once you were hired, you were pretty much committed to that position for 6 months, might have been able to get something else. BUT, that brings me back to point 1. May not have been as green as I thought on the other side of the fence.
Raspewtin
Stay at home defenseman hater
- May 30, 2013
- 44,302
- 21,912
So i'm posting the story of my life in hopes that it inspires somebody else, but more importantly to drive home just how much "luck" is involved in getting that really ****ing elusive first job.
If you don't know me IRL (a handful of you do) I'm a 22 year old Compensation Analyst/HR Business Partner for a large scale entertainment company servicing contracted employees, multiconcurrent employees, and a bunch of other employment classes specializing in equity compensation and bonus structures. To put this as blunt as I can, I had absolutely no ****ing intention of ending up where I am right now, but god DAMN am I happy I did.
I've been in finance my entire life. I was a member of the business club in high school, took financial electives in high school, joined a fraternity with a plethora of finance alumni, and did a number of internships that directly pertained to what I wanted to do (I originally wanted to work on the buyer side of IB). Some of my internships (I had 5 total in my academic career) were absolute class with top notch compensation, excellent leadership, and really well structured programs in place for its members. But those internships don't turn you into a savage. Their a resume goldmine and have some excellent skill building exercises, but the difficult internships (that are usually illegal) are the ones that made me into a hungry, excel maestro psycho that I wound up being. I also participated in my school's portfolio planning, attempted to compete in the CFA challenge (lol, didn't go well), and got numerous excellent contacts in school. Me and a classmate almost had a case study we did published but we simply didn't have the time to complete our paper in time.
Now why the **** did I tell you all that? Because it did **** all to get me a job out of undergrad. Go figure, like most finance professionals my age can attest to, my resume still wasn't much better than a handful of my graduating class. All that hard work did **** all when it came to send in 200 applications only to get like 4 responses for thinly veiled sales positions that I had no interest in doing. It was dehumanizing. I felt like a total failure and that I was doomed to bartend for like 10 years while trying to get those ****s at Goldman Sachs to like me. I applied to the 5 year program at my school to do my MBA concurrently with my bachelors. So a full year of pointless attempts at networking (learned that real quick from this thread, LOL) and some more pointless resume stroking ahead. Yippee.
So I decided to apply to a company I liked a bit so I had something to do for my last fall semester. I actually totally ****ed up my interview because of a clerical error and it poorly set the tone for the entire interview. The recruiter called me back while I was **** drunk to let me know she went in another direction (although she had made up her mind on a candidate and I was just a formality, I found this out later on). But she let me know that someone in HR really liked my resume and wanted to talk to me. Now sober me would have said **** no to this, and call it a waste of time, but I was happy and in another place so I was like SUREEEE LETS TALK. Our interview went excellent and I was hired into the role, I was actually their first intern in that particular sub department. Hit it off really well with my boss and my supervisor and was quite literally thrown to the wolves because our department was heinously understaffed at the time. My role had me reviewing stock award contracts and loosely managing the plan, general administrative stuff but I caught on very quickly and became very well versed in our plans and their structures as time went on. I became the go-to guy for this stuff because my director was so busy and it was in the middle of a rough season for us. I started asking for more work, and developed my skills there like nowhere else with an excellent group of mentors. They extended me for another semester because I was really happy there and fit well in my role; it was in the back of my mind that I wanted to do something like this instead of IB but I didn't take it that seriously. My second semester I started interacting with the SVP of my department a lot more, doing projects just between us and preparing presentations for him. My SVP was ****ing incredible and to this day, the best boss I've ever had. Keep in mind, I was hired more in a data analysis role and a lot less in a compensation role, but compensation were so worked to death they absolutely needed me there; my supervisor (the guy that hired me) was doing work he quite literally had never done before because they were desperate.
I let my SVP know I wanted to make a career here, and that I've never been so engaged like I was here. He subtly pushed me onto other teams that needed help after me telling him this and I thrived, because this was obviously a test and I wasn't about to fail it. Loved my role, got as involved with the company and corporate outings as I could, and was generally having a great time and learning more every day. I would get officially hired halfway through the semester, even though we didn't really have the budget room for this, and I went through the ****ing roof. Today I got a big salary adjustment as part of our new approach to young talent retention, and I'm making serious money right now when people my age aren't even getting jobs. I'm so blessed and thankful that my work paid off, but, let's recap here.
1) I (THANK GOD) ****ed up an interview that cost me the job I originally wanted and was SIGNIFICANTLY more qualified for.
2) I was **** drunk and in a totally different state when I agreed to another interview that I absolutely would not have done sober.
3) I was the first intern in this department.
4) I got a supervisor who was brand new to this field who was willing to go on the line to give me very sensitive work. Things most supervisors, uh, would not do.
5) I was dropped into a team that was mostly new and in an extremely busy and stressful time of the year.
6) I was blessed with an amazing team that wanted nothing more than to see me succeed.
7) I was fortunate enough to stupidly go the MBA route, which bought me a PERFECT amount of time to.........totally change my career?
8) I was fortunate enough to have a SVP who WENT OUT OF BUDGET to keep me.
9) I got a very, very gracious salary adjustment, because of my MBA.
Sure, I worked my ****ing ass off to get where I am now. But look at all the dumb luck I got hit with to get there. Look at all of the "wow, this really happened?" situations I encountered. I just wanted something to do for a semester!!!! And here I am.....the happiest I've ever been and in an absolutely wonderful spot in my life and my career.
All of you youngins (people my age, lol) need to take note. It's so luck based. Getting that 1st job is so damn hard because so little separates us from each other. Really, none of the advice I could give you differs from most of the excellent advice some quality posters here have given. But as a generation, we're really fighting an uphill battle, and it's hard man. I'm blessed, every day I recognize this. But you will be too. I promise.
Know your worth, try new things, grind away those internships you hate, get people on your side. The keys to success.
It's hard guys, but I have faith in all of you. And I'd be delighted to help any of you with networking or anything you might want to know. We're a great group here, hit us up.
Godspeed friends.
If you don't know me IRL (a handful of you do) I'm a 22 year old Compensation Analyst/HR Business Partner for a large scale entertainment company servicing contracted employees, multiconcurrent employees, and a bunch of other employment classes specializing in equity compensation and bonus structures. To put this as blunt as I can, I had absolutely no ****ing intention of ending up where I am right now, but god DAMN am I happy I did.
I've been in finance my entire life. I was a member of the business club in high school, took financial electives in high school, joined a fraternity with a plethora of finance alumni, and did a number of internships that directly pertained to what I wanted to do (I originally wanted to work on the buyer side of IB). Some of my internships (I had 5 total in my academic career) were absolute class with top notch compensation, excellent leadership, and really well structured programs in place for its members. But those internships don't turn you into a savage. Their a resume goldmine and have some excellent skill building exercises, but the difficult internships (that are usually illegal) are the ones that made me into a hungry, excel maestro psycho that I wound up being. I also participated in my school's portfolio planning, attempted to compete in the CFA challenge (lol, didn't go well), and got numerous excellent contacts in school. Me and a classmate almost had a case study we did published but we simply didn't have the time to complete our paper in time.
Now why the **** did I tell you all that? Because it did **** all to get me a job out of undergrad. Go figure, like most finance professionals my age can attest to, my resume still wasn't much better than a handful of my graduating class. All that hard work did **** all when it came to send in 200 applications only to get like 4 responses for thinly veiled sales positions that I had no interest in doing. It was dehumanizing. I felt like a total failure and that I was doomed to bartend for like 10 years while trying to get those ****s at Goldman Sachs to like me. I applied to the 5 year program at my school to do my MBA concurrently with my bachelors. So a full year of pointless attempts at networking (learned that real quick from this thread, LOL) and some more pointless resume stroking ahead. Yippee.
So I decided to apply to a company I liked a bit so I had something to do for my last fall semester. I actually totally ****ed up my interview because of a clerical error and it poorly set the tone for the entire interview. The recruiter called me back while I was **** drunk to let me know she went in another direction (although she had made up her mind on a candidate and I was just a formality, I found this out later on). But she let me know that someone in HR really liked my resume and wanted to talk to me. Now sober me would have said **** no to this, and call it a waste of time, but I was happy and in another place so I was like SUREEEE LETS TALK. Our interview went excellent and I was hired into the role, I was actually their first intern in that particular sub department. Hit it off really well with my boss and my supervisor and was quite literally thrown to the wolves because our department was heinously understaffed at the time. My role had me reviewing stock award contracts and loosely managing the plan, general administrative stuff but I caught on very quickly and became very well versed in our plans and their structures as time went on. I became the go-to guy for this stuff because my director was so busy and it was in the middle of a rough season for us. I started asking for more work, and developed my skills there like nowhere else with an excellent group of mentors. They extended me for another semester because I was really happy there and fit well in my role; it was in the back of my mind that I wanted to do something like this instead of IB but I didn't take it that seriously. My second semester I started interacting with the SVP of my department a lot more, doing projects just between us and preparing presentations for him. My SVP was ****ing incredible and to this day, the best boss I've ever had. Keep in mind, I was hired more in a data analysis role and a lot less in a compensation role, but compensation were so worked to death they absolutely needed me there; my supervisor (the guy that hired me) was doing work he quite literally had never done before because they were desperate.
I let my SVP know I wanted to make a career here, and that I've never been so engaged like I was here. He subtly pushed me onto other teams that needed help after me telling him this and I thrived, because this was obviously a test and I wasn't about to fail it. Loved my role, got as involved with the company and corporate outings as I could, and was generally having a great time and learning more every day. I would get officially hired halfway through the semester, even though we didn't really have the budget room for this, and I went through the ****ing roof. Today I got a big salary adjustment as part of our new approach to young talent retention, and I'm making serious money right now when people my age aren't even getting jobs. I'm so blessed and thankful that my work paid off, but, let's recap here.
1) I (THANK GOD) ****ed up an interview that cost me the job I originally wanted and was SIGNIFICANTLY more qualified for.
2) I was **** drunk and in a totally different state when I agreed to another interview that I absolutely would not have done sober.
3) I was the first intern in this department.
4) I got a supervisor who was brand new to this field who was willing to go on the line to give me very sensitive work. Things most supervisors, uh, would not do.
5) I was dropped into a team that was mostly new and in an extremely busy and stressful time of the year.
6) I was blessed with an amazing team that wanted nothing more than to see me succeed.
7) I was fortunate enough to stupidly go the MBA route, which bought me a PERFECT amount of time to.........totally change my career?
8) I was fortunate enough to have a SVP who WENT OUT OF BUDGET to keep me.
9) I got a very, very gracious salary adjustment, because of my MBA.
Sure, I worked my ****ing ass off to get where I am now. But look at all the dumb luck I got hit with to get there. Look at all of the "wow, this really happened?" situations I encountered. I just wanted something to do for a semester!!!! And here I am.....the happiest I've ever been and in an absolutely wonderful spot in my life and my career.
All of you youngins (people my age, lol) need to take note. It's so luck based. Getting that 1st job is so damn hard because so little separates us from each other. Really, none of the advice I could give you differs from most of the excellent advice some quality posters here have given. But as a generation, we're really fighting an uphill battle, and it's hard man. I'm blessed, every day I recognize this. But you will be too. I promise.
Know your worth, try new things, grind away those internships you hate, get people on your side. The keys to success.
It's hard guys, but I have faith in all of you. And I'd be delighted to help any of you with networking or anything you might want to know. We're a great group here, hit us up.
Godspeed friends.
Machinehead
HFNYR MVP
Raspewtin's post is 10/10. Bookmark it.
I've changed things as well. I was teaching English to college kids (private business) and first of all, teaching English is supposed to be "easy" but it can be a ****ing pain in the ass. It's interpretive. My reading of literature and my subsequent writing is my vision. I can preach techniques until I'm blue in the face, but I can't give them my vision. College kids, no offense as I'm sure many of you are, also are a pain in the ass to tutor. First of all, you can't charge nearly as much if you're doing it privately, because they're paying tuition and living on ramen as it is. Secondly, they're away from their parents and being responsible for the first time (I understand, we've all been there) and there's a lot of hand-holding involved. It becomes almost my responsibility that they meet deadlines, and it's so much pressure. Then again, even if they are on point, they're fully responsible, so it's late-night phone calls, and working until sunrise, and working 60 hours a week during finals and midterms. I was just getting sick of it and was really discouraged because this had been, like, my thing.
Then I get a call (again, dumb luck, back to Rasp's point) from a parent who goes to college and saw my advertising. She calls me and asks if I can help with her kid. Long story short, the kid is like super smart and in 7th grade, is taking tests to get into fancy high schools. They wanna make sure he passes and he needs help with his reading comprehension. Again, sometimes frustrating, because I can't just make this kid read like I do. Anyway, the dad mentions to me that they're also looking for someone to help him with the math part of his test. I've never taught math, so I don't think twice about it.
One day I give the kid something to read, and I don't like to stare at him while he reads because he feels pressure, so I occupy myself with something, and I started flipping through his math book. I said "****, I can do this." So I told the dad "listen, I can teach him math," and they gave me a lot more hours and now we're doing math also.
Math is great because while reading is interpretive, in math, if the answer is five, it's ****ing five. If I can get him to five, my work is done. I don't need to instill in him a greater awareness of the text. Also, the parents are great because parents have actual careers and make actual money, and can compensate me equal to the work I put in. Moreover, the parents keep the kid on the ball and make sure he does his homework. When I go home for the day, I'm home. I don't get the panicked phone calls, the stress over deadlines, or "I know it's 8 pages but I did 4, can you just look at it?" I'm responsible for the kid and I want to see him succeed, but when I go home at the end of the day, I wanna be done and that's it, you know? And it's nice that I don't have a massive workload for two weeks during midterms and finals, and then I'm poor for a month after because nobody cares until they have finals or midterms. The work with kids is consistent.
Plus, there's still this weird reputation that ELA is easy, so you can get so much more coin for tutoring math.
So I started with college English but kids' math might end up being my jam
I've changed things as well. I was teaching English to college kids (private business) and first of all, teaching English is supposed to be "easy" but it can be a ****ing pain in the ass. It's interpretive. My reading of literature and my subsequent writing is my vision. I can preach techniques until I'm blue in the face, but I can't give them my vision. College kids, no offense as I'm sure many of you are, also are a pain in the ass to tutor. First of all, you can't charge nearly as much if you're doing it privately, because they're paying tuition and living on ramen as it is. Secondly, they're away from their parents and being responsible for the first time (I understand, we've all been there) and there's a lot of hand-holding involved. It becomes almost my responsibility that they meet deadlines, and it's so much pressure. Then again, even if they are on point, they're fully responsible, so it's late-night phone calls, and working until sunrise, and working 60 hours a week during finals and midterms. I was just getting sick of it and was really discouraged because this had been, like, my thing.
Then I get a call (again, dumb luck, back to Rasp's point) from a parent who goes to college and saw my advertising. She calls me and asks if I can help with her kid. Long story short, the kid is like super smart and in 7th grade, is taking tests to get into fancy high schools. They wanna make sure he passes and he needs help with his reading comprehension. Again, sometimes frustrating, because I can't just make this kid read like I do. Anyway, the dad mentions to me that they're also looking for someone to help him with the math part of his test. I've never taught math, so I don't think twice about it.
One day I give the kid something to read, and I don't like to stare at him while he reads because he feels pressure, so I occupy myself with something, and I started flipping through his math book. I said "****, I can do this." So I told the dad "listen, I can teach him math," and they gave me a lot more hours and now we're doing math also.
Math is great because while reading is interpretive, in math, if the answer is five, it's ****ing five. If I can get him to five, my work is done. I don't need to instill in him a greater awareness of the text. Also, the parents are great because parents have actual careers and make actual money, and can compensate me equal to the work I put in. Moreover, the parents keep the kid on the ball and make sure he does his homework. When I go home for the day, I'm home. I don't get the panicked phone calls, the stress over deadlines, or "I know it's 8 pages but I did 4, can you just look at it?" I'm responsible for the kid and I want to see him succeed, but when I go home at the end of the day, I wanna be done and that's it, you know? And it's nice that I don't have a massive workload for two weeks during midterms and finals, and then I'm poor for a month after because nobody cares until they have finals or midterms. The work with kids is consistent.
Plus, there's still this weird reputation that ELA is easy, so you can get so much more coin for tutoring math.
So I started with college English but kids' math might end up being my jam
LaffyTaffy
Brooklyn-Belarussian
Where are you going to college kid, if you dont mind me asking? Fellow Baruch incoming freshman by any chance?
- Status
