Freshmen spring quarter roundup!
Here we are at the end of my first year at UCSC. Crazy to think about, it definitely was a long year, it feels like I was in high school playing basket random in Ekstrom a while ago. Definitely didn't blow by when I look at it. Let's get into this post. The last month of the quarter there were some really big protests on campus where classes went online and things were pretty crazy.
References:
Academics
I took 3 classes this quarter:
- Writing 2
- AM 30 (Multivar for engineers)
- CSE 13S (Computer Systems and C Programming)
People gas up CSE 13S to be a super hard class and that may be the case but I had professor Rudnick and with him that class was soooo easy. But anyway because I was scared I supplemented CSE 13S with AM 30, a required course for my major, and Writing 2, a required writing class that I want to get out the way. I was thinking about taking a 4th class but I didn't necessarily have anything in mind. My courseload ended up being really easy, because my AM 30 class that was my third time learning multivariable content lmao. SO safe to say I know multivar very well now because I've learned it in 2022, 2023, and now 2024. My hardest class was probably Writing 2 because of the courseload, we had to write like 2 reading reflections a week and we had projects too, it was just such a pain because of how time consuming those homework assignments were. I would say my Fall quarter was my hardest quarter, then my Winter quarter, then my Spring quarter, so literally decreasing in difficulty.
Writing 2
This class was every tuesday and thursday from 11:40 - 1:15 and with some of those days playing poker I was struggling to wake up on time 💀. In fact one time I was going to wake up early to finish my essay and turn it in and then go to class but I LEGIT DIDNT KNOW THAT I PRESSED STOP INSTEAD OF SNOOZE WHEN MY ALARM WENT OFF AND I SO THEN I SLEPT THROUGH THE ENTIRE CLASS LMAO. I literally missed the deadline for a MAJOR PROJECT, we have 3 major projects where each project is worth 15% of our grade. GOOD THING THOUGH... the late penalty was only 10% so I got an 85% after the penalty. That's still not good, but if the late penalty was like 50% or something I would've been so cooked. Dude I was literally like flushed out when I realized I slept through that class. I was legit freaking out I was like "oh no oh nononoohonono not like this not like this" if I get a B or A- in A FKING WRITING 2 CLASS MAN nonononono. And not to mention that but missing that lecture was super bad too, because attendance is worth 20% of our grade and we have 2 classes that we can msis for free. I had that trip to Orlando for ICPC where I would miss two class sessions and I talked to him about it and he just said that he already has the 2 class policy thing so he wouldn't let me off the hook. So basically I just automatically got like a -1.5% in my grade from missing a class. So THINGS WERE NOT LOOKING GOOD. There's also like no extra credit in the class.
But THANK GOD FOR THE PROTESTS LMAO BECAUSE my writing 2 classes were cancelled when I was gone for Orlando and I ended up with 100% in attendance category. My professor Daniel Copulsky is like a PhD student for like literature journalism or something and he was on strike with all the TAs and grad students or something, so there were a ton of strikes and protests during this quarter.
Anyway, with my attendance being saved I also clutched up by acing like pretty much every other assignment in the course. It's so hard sweating on the small reading reflections because they take so much time and after you finish one there's another one assigned the next day man I NEVER WANT TO TAKE A WRITING CLASS EVER AGAIN and I'm pretty sure I don't have to.
The protests actually came in so clutch, without that this quarter would've been super stressful with managing this class. Tons of reading reflections and assignments were excused when it went online and my professor went on strike. The last project which i chose as a video project of the quarter I remember I cooked up in like 2 days, just hard at work in the Computer lab. I spent like 2 long afternoons and nights working on that and it ended up getting like 300+ views on YouTube randomly lmao: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpD2Y4WiykY. That made me happy. I'm very proud of the video considering like half of it is bullsht lmao, the conclusion I literally jsut go "AI is multifaceted" and just say a whole lot of nothing. You can tackle any debate with just "ohh well actually it's multifaceted" like that sht is so corny its a cop-out but I did cop out because I didn't rly give a sht lmao.
AM 30 (Multivar for engineers)
Like I mentioned before I already knew all the materials but I need to take this for my major req so this was just some light*ss work. This class was quite interesting, quite unique though. My professor Javier was literally so bad dude literally would go over like the most basic and conceptual concepts and then lecture would end before we would do any actual applicable examples. Like when we were going over 2d limits this guy spent like 30 minutes reviewing 1d limits and going over examples that sht was legit hilarious cuz I remember walking out of that lecture and going to my friend "we really just spent 90 minutes learning all that bullsht" and just laughing because of how ridiculous it is. And then every lecture he would get into an argument with this kid Shaun and it was so funny cuz this kid Shaun would start yapping about random stuff and you could tell Javier was so pissed and he would interrupt and go "Please just talk to me after class" but shaun wouldnt care LMAO bro one time this guy Shaun got up from his seat and started cutting imaginary bread to explain how he interpreted 4d space and this guy Javier literally was about to freak out he was like "ill get it after class" at least like 10 times but Shaun would keep yapping and cutting his bread on the table and asking Javier if he understood. This kid would also start tweaking out randomly during class like one time he was like "I DONT HAVE A PEN" during the midterm and started yelling and stuff that sht was actually hilarious. This kid would sit in the front row right in the middle right in front of Javier and ask like 20 questions during every lecture and some of the questions were so funny this kid would ask like "is there going to be a quiz this week" halfway during lecture just randomly. That kid was so legendary, it rly made the class fun and going to lecture somewhat enjoyable since it was mandatory.
Anyway, grades wise I remember I stopped taking notes like 4 lectures in when I realized that these lectures was just Javier trolling lmao so I would just think about codeforces problems and then read the slides which were pretty good. The midterm was super easy, and so was the final. I didn't do much studying, I just did all the review worksheets and made sure to practice the common problem types. There really isn't many places where you can mess up in other than making calculation errors. Maybe it's easy for me because I already knew these concepts beforehawn. Oh yea I also forgot to mention this guy Javier was like 4 weeks behind he would move so slow and he cancelled class like 3 times for emergencies. I remember the midterm was next week and we were like "we literally learned 2 concepts wtf is gonna be even on the midterm" sht was funny. We ended up bullshtting double integrals when the protests made class go online and we didn't even go over shells, washers, disks which is a BLESSING because I really don't wanna relearn that sht. So annoying.
With the SETS extra credit there wasn't much at stake going into the Final I remember, I was stressed initially but when reviewing I realized that all this content was so easy and that I just can't forget the formulas/concepts.
CSE 13S (Computer Systems and C Programming)
This class was really good, professor Rudnick was a great lecturer and I learned a lot about C. It definitely took me some moments to fully comprehend malloc and free and pointers and strings. It's kinda crazy how this language only has like 4 data structures or something, there's no maps, sets, lists, deques.
Anyway this class was very straightforward because of that and it also helped that I knew some C++ from my days learning it on binarysearch.com. All the homework assignements and exam FRQs were just algorithm problems in C which was super easy for me. I will say a lot of the conceptual things and stuff about like hardware and like about the systems it self I still don't really get, lot of the mc questions on the exams were pretty sus.
Anyway that's all I have to say about this class ig. I also learned a lot about vms and linux commands fully which is always helpful and useful.
I ended up acing the midterm and final which was lowkey a bit lucky since I was unsure on some of the MC questions. I lost some points on homework 7 from my program tweaking out on one of their test cases which I sohuld probably look into since I'll learn something but I'm too lazy to boot up the vm lmao. This class ended up being very easy and manageable despite being the stigma around it.
Others + Conclusion
Usually on the roundup posts I have like a 'fitness' section after and like a 'food' section but like that sht requires like two sentences max. So fitness was good, literally like there's nothing else to say lmao I like my routine a lot, wish I could play more basketball at santa cruz.
Food was same scenario as winter quarter where I'm on the lowest plan and just eating at the dining hall if the menu is good and if it's not I go to banana joes or oakes cafe or eat at the cafe in mchenry library. On the weekends if I'm staying at Santa Cruz I will often grubhub if the dininghall is bad since everything else is closed. I did go to Rachel Carson dining hall which had milkshakes a lot since I have AM 30 and CSE13S with my friend Evan and I end up spending a lot of time with him studying and stuff.
During memorial weekend I had like a 6 day trip to ICPC NAC 2024 at UCF which was just such an experience and so inspiring, motivating. It made me realize I need to really lock in man, when I hvae time this summer I can't disappoint myself. Big trip during the quarter, also just super fun trip. Here's a bonus clip that I didn't include in the dedicated blog post that I found afterwards on Shayan's channel: https://youtu.be/4kEoQ6yM76U?t=457. Auto-Timestamped 7:34.
And I think that's it for my freshmen year spring quarter and my first year at UCSC. The protests were definitely unique and there was also a big encampment too with tons of tents in the plaza. The bookstore was shut down and everything, it was like almost 2 weeks long. It's pretty crazy that I didnt get a single A- during this year, in fact i think I didn't get a single grade under 97%, correct me if I'm wrong. That's wild, like highschool was so hard and I go to Santa Cruz and like I'm somehow I'm considered smart and stuff idk it's still kinda crazy that classes and grading turned out this way. Made lots of friends and my second year at UCSC will definitely be interesting living off campus. Wondering what's in store for that year, I'm also hoping to join the UCSC blueprint club next year and just grind a ton of CP, ICPC regionals is in November which is super soon. I hate how it's so soon because I really don't have much time this summer to fully dive in. It's whatever tho ig, really gotta lock in man I really gotta lock in it's super important. I just can't disappoint myself, if I disappoint myself I don't know what imma do. I can't look back on this and be like "man, I wish I could've done more." I can't do that to myself.
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