EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Does anyone else have the horrible problem that we are encountering???
High School exams and the first week of FIRST are the same week.
I feel like crying. Sleep deprivation has come early.
Help me out!!!

Do I study AP Chem or design our bot?

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

We have that, but rather than it being our first week, its our second week. we have decided that the people with exams the next day do not have to show up for the meetings the night before and the seniors do not have to show up the night before or the one before that from the day of their exam.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

we get this every year. Our exams start friday ! ahhhhh

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Yeah. This really isn't cool. Its Sunday night, I'm behind on all of my studying, and I'm surfing CD. AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

i'm just gonna study durin classes and at nite when we rnt buildin or designin and stuff, and anyway, if u agree or not, exams are more important

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

depends on if you are into college or not yet. GO EARLY DECISION. actually, I wills study so that they cant recind my offer of admission

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I'd say study for your exams...if you fail a class, you'll be kicked off of robotics. At least, that's how our team is. Our finals were the last 2 days before Christmas break so we all missed it but I can assure you, the sleep deprevation is already here, for me.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

My school has that same thing. I have two exams each day wen.-fri. The answer is just stop sleeping, and drink alot of pop. then crash all day sat.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

heh, i have midterms along with the fact that all of my teachers want some sort of large project turned in before the rapidly-approaching end of the report card period. Plus I have a job, and a girlfriend. So to answer your question- multitask! :yikes:

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Come on Bill, Don't leave the designing a bot just to me and Ben. Get crackin! :D

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

School first.
Robots second.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

AP Chem all the way. You'll be thanking yourself for getting good grades in it when you get to be as old as me :)

Your team should understand, especially your faculty members. Force yourself to think about design only a half hour before the meeting and then stay the whole meeting or sit down and think about it for an hour, tell your ideas to a mentor, and skip the meeting.

And, it's all about the tricks of the trade: I used to study during build season by promising that if I study for a solid hour, I could give myself 15 min to check CD, grab a drink, etc. Sometimes I followed it, sometimes I didn't....but I was always happier the times that I did stick to it.

Or groupstudy! When I was in HS class would let out at 2:05 and the meetings didn't start until 4....so the students would help eachother study or do homework until the meeting began.

Hope this helps :)

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I know for our team, we just take exam review days off, and then for the turn around days where only teachers are in the school we're right back at it. Because we are a Canadian team, exams fall in week three of the competition.

Good luck everyone on the studiing, and the design/building.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Our team has a saying:

"Grades first, FIRST second."

It's Über important to get your work and studies done first. That's more important then any robot. We have exams next week too and Mr. Clarke is focusing on getting our school work done over robot.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

School needs to become before FIRST. Grades do not need to suffer because you are too involved into the build season this year. That is how my team feels at least. Study. During our 'union breaks' we do our homework, study, and all that. Our mentors understand this.

I know you want to spend all your time outside of school doing robotics. This can be possible though and still keep your grades up. Time management is the key. That may mean giving up your lunch period do to homework or your mornings before school doing that too.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Good. I'm not alone. I have a major lack of time with midterms and FIRST.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

My midterms fall during the third week of the build, fortuanely we going in till like 11 on those days to jsut take the exams and then meetings dont start until mid-late afternoon... so I luck out there :D

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

School always ideally, comes before FIRST. Sometimes, when you are in a real time crunch, like right before the shipping date, school gets sacrificed a little bit. I have the same problem... I'm planning on studying most days, but putting in about 10 hours in two days on Wednesday and Thursday. I wish our schools were smart enough to have finals BEFORE break, or else FIRST should make kickoff one week later. No break is better than overlapping things.
Good luck with everything...

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

*Chuckle* Exam week actually gives me MORE time for robotics, since we get off if we don't have exams, and 639 works 8 hours a day for the whole week. If I don't have an exam (and I only know of one so far), I work on the robot. Hahaha, us dirty Sophmores. Not the lowest on the totem pole anymore, but with about the same workload. But, I do agree on the point about school before FIRST. I mean, FIRST might look good on a college application, but they look at GPA first. And our team has the same policy on grades: You fail, you're out.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Our exams started last wed. and we have our last ones tomorrow. We met to watch the kickoff, bu the teachers decided to cancel the meeting that we usually have the day after kickoff to brainstorm. I'm getting antsy wainting for our next meeting on wed.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I've actually got FOUR finals tomorrow...as soon as I eat, I'm going to study. Lots. And hope I don't fail...

:(

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I would try to do both but if you can't I would sacrafice Chem First, FIRST will be more important than eating for the next 6 weeks.

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

well i am in just about the same boat you are pal. except for at my school we have this program called A+A>5. if you earned an A BOTH quarters and had no more than 4 absenses (excused or unexcused) the exam doesnt count against you. you still get the grade you got on your report card, but our transcripts dont record the semester exam grades (therefore the colleges dont see that you failed the final but got an A for the semester). I have chem AP, what a great class, hahahahha, we have a great teacher and he is the advisor to our robotics club (which i am the president for). but lucky for me, i dont have to worry about the chem exam. we are meeting everyday this week after we have a break for lunch and exams. depending on your grades and what colleges you want to apply for, study for the exam. but if you are comfortable with getting by, GO ROBOT GO. thats my advice. choose wisely...
peace out from sunny and warm las vegas, NEVADA!

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I'm still leaning towards studying for Chem. I WISH I was in the same boat as SuperDave when I was in HS, but our advisor was in tech-ed and even though I spent about half of my high school year in his classroom I never took one of his classes.

But as he said, choose wisely. The money you save by getting those credits now will be your own :)

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I'm really behind in my work...*sigh of relief*
Glad Beta Bot got over, before Exams!
Yesteday, I slept at 3, working on my assignment!

...It's funny, how doing a Psychology Essay on Insomnia, has made me an insomanic myself!

Exams next week....and I really do not want my average to go down!
I think I'll be skipping a few meetings!

However, our school stresses on not neglecting our studies, and making our grades suffer, because of extra-curricular activities...
I try to get everything over during Lunch, but there aren't a lot of committed people during this time of the year!
LoL!

Anyways....All the best everyone!

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

ahh who needs school... ive never studied for an exam and i always seem to do alrite on them...plus if u try to study u wont be able to stop thinking about the bot and ull go off into little design rants and forget about studying , but then go back to it, not really learning anything at all, and then eventually forgetting about that killer idea u had to raise ur 7 inch high bot that runs on treads to get an arm 9 feet in the air....... so pretty much u wont be able to study or design if u choose to study, so go for FIRST stuff :)

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Jeez..that's me...
When i'm supposed to be drawing ray diagrams, and the next thing you know..I'm designing a robot on the paper!
Nothing new....but oh well, the fact still keep nagging at the back of my mind,..that I have an EXAM!!!!
..and then I end up getting nothing done, but I always do pretty good on exams...but it is hard to concentrate with so much going on!

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

dont feel bad... there are thousands people like you around the whole nation who has final exams next week when they have to be stressed about building a bot for this season...

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

What is the team's policy?

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Heh... well, im a slacker, so I just put all my time into robotics. (If you were on my team last year, you would know that I missed like a total of 5 hours in the whole building season. I would have to go with Robotics... like i did during exams last week. ;)

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

Right, Thats why I sit up and study all night , Robtics all day. I know its a little insane, but its within my capabilities :p

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

My team has meetings during exams, but they are totally volentary, and if you're doing bad in school, parents have every right to yank you out!! Now, trying having 5 different high schools with 5 different exam schedules, no wonder i don't sleep with 2 weeks left..........
try doing that attendence too:ahh:
But school definetly come first, i mean, grades in general will drop if you're in first (3rd Quarter, duhhh) but exams are special, i hope you study, or at least sleep, or at the very least drink lots of dew!!
Plus right now we only have meetings 4 times a week:p
yahh for freedom!

Re: EXAM Week! What Should I Do?
 

I'm also in this situation, though its our second week of FIRST...

got two days of hell before me... was up til; 3 last night, will be up to 3 tonight, and most likely tomorrow