I’ve always enjoyed my math courses, even the really hard ones!
Those skills come in handy sometimes. For example, just today, I was working on a project, and I needed to create an equation so that an object would trace the path of a parabola. After figuring out a few sets of coordinates in MakeCode Arcade, I smashed some buttons on a graphing calculator, et voilà! My sprite traced a perfect parabola with perfect timing!
I had really mixed feelings about my computer science courses in college … mostly because I didn’t have very good instructors for many of them. I had an awesome instructor for my database course, though, and I loved that class!
My two favorite courses in college, though, were the history of English and Shakespeare. In the history of English course, I learned why we have such strange spelling, and I learned how to transliterate into IPA, which is just a super cool way of expressing pronunciation. My Shakespeare class, of course, looked at many of the bard’s plays and sonnets. I already enjoyed his work; I learned to appreciate it even more through that course.
Another of my favorite courses was yet another English course, taught by a faculty member who was revered by nearly everyone on campus. While I enjoyed the course, I enjoyed Dr. Williams’s lectures much more. He was a gifted orator, and I’m so glad I was able to take one of his classes! He affirmed my view that teaching is entertainment.
I wish I had known about some of the really cool classes at my university before graduating, like the history of music and jazz appreciation.
At the moment, I’m learning about FPGAs, VHDL, and SystemVerilog, and I’m revisiting digital electronics in the process. My goal is to build a simple computer system on an FPGA and write system software for it, and then write a computer architecture course around that project.
Never stop learning!