Here’s the third installment of the Career & Academics Cornerstone Series:
Defining Moments
If you had to sum up your life in a snippet, it would likely be composed of several pivotal moments in your life – some instances in which what you need to do with the rest of your life becomes perfectly clear and obvious. You might have experienced some sort of a mental shift and that resolution leads you to carry out the steps to make your decision into a reality.
Focusing this part of the Cornerstone series on such instances in your careers, including pre-school years, college life, internships, or even a simple chat with a friend… share your own “Defining Moments”… those intuitive flashes which may even have defied your preliminary rationalization or a roadmap that you may have considered for yourself.
I was around 16 years old at the time, and was preparing for my A-Level exams in Business, Physics and Mathematics. I had a friend who was doing the opposite – a happy-go-lucky lad who knew how to have fun even at the most stressful of times. About a month before the exam time, it hit him that he wasn’t prepared at all, and he approached several teachers at the school for help, and contaceted various tutoring centers. Everyone had declined to take him on with such a short timeline. Dejected and disheartened, the guy was about to cancel his exams and was ready to spend another year to prepare for them. Upon my insistence, he agreed to persist with his original plans and I tried to help by inducting him on a rather intensive study schedule. We would spend all-nighters in the school classrooms (got to know the watchman there rather well), utilize the library in our spare classes, and work away at my home over the weekends.
Of course we both knew that the guy is far lagging to be able to achieve marvels in the exams, but by the end of it all, he ended up with Bs in the two courses that I helped him with. He was ecstatic and appreciative... a couple of teachers in our school commended us for our hard work and I got nominated the student of the year for not giving up on this guy whom other teachers had shunned.
I still remember the feeling of anxiousness when I was waiting for my friend outside the British Council office where he went to find out his results, and the emotion of gratification when he told me his grades. I think that was my first defining moment, and here I am today teaching as a University Professor at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
gosh I can't think of a single defining moment.. Right now, i've been thinking a lot, vowing to make things different and promise to be more determined and focus.. but thas it, it's all thoughts and empty promises to myself; I won't have much opportunity to make it all a reality until much later..
i was eating icecream one day when i was 19 and a monkey threw 2 sticks at me i used one stick to beat the hell out of the monkey and i cooked the other stick and fed to my friends. They were impressed by the taste and urged me to sell the product. i started grinding monkey sticks and started selling them as ** Shaan Masala **
^ true that Sarah… and the bittersweetness of life develops as some of our experiences get dark enough to overpower the other trivial ones… a.k.a. “Defining Moments”.
C’Mon ppl… no one had any defining moments in their professional careers ??!??
I was not doing well in undergrad, was in engineering/comp sci and just did nto like it and felt a little trapped. had some other personal issues and my grades went south. I wanted to quit school think about what i wanted to do and then return to school. a few guys who were doign their masters took me under their wing, my advisor talked to me and realizing that i was lookign at other things introduced me to a prof at the school of business. I decided i wanted to do business and still have some technology background but just did not want to be a techie.
teh same senior guys asked me to move in an apt next to them for summer and they said they would take care of all things, my food, chores anythign and all i should do is give it my best, and after the end of the summer session if i still felt i needed to drop out then thats that.
I also got back into student leadership and ran for student govt election where i was elected as a member and the next year as the chairperson.
I was on deans list that summer, the next semester, the following semester, received awards from univ VP, Uni President, mayor of the city etc.
I was really low on self confidence at the start of that summer and did a major turnaround..to a point that when I started getting scholaistic awards and noone would believe that I had tanked things so bad once.
That was a defining moment..finding what interetsed me was a definign moment, applying myself and seeing results etc etc.
I can never thank those guys enough..they were among the strongest positive influence on my life.
Have had so many defining moments. My grade eight teacher for math called my parents in one day and told them that I was "inconsistent". He was right and my worst enemy became myself. At one moment I was being streamed into internationally recognized advanced level maths and sciences, getting As in philosophy and a 4.0, 98% in English, the next I was getting Fs and on academic probation, messing up every opportunity that came my way. Every semester is that same battle, of knowing that I am perfectly capable of getting straight As but somehow always managing to mess up (I have still managed to get many As but they feel liks F's). I think I just lack self control, in which case I sometimes think I should just give up on grad school dreams before the stress eats me up. The only thing is, I know I can do well in grad school and genuinely love academia...
Same as Fraudz, I was close to dropping out a few years ago because of some big personal problems but my father supported me at that time. Instead of "maar and chittars", he said one more semester, if that doesn't work, you can quit school.
A recent "defining moment" was weekly sitting across from the brightest people in the world; neurosurgeons and neurologists, hearing them discuss things most peopleare ordinarily never privy to.
I am such a fcuck up, really, and probably always will be a tormented fcuck up.
I had okay grades from class 1-5, used to rank anywhere from 5th to 10th in a class of around 45. Then class 6 onwards i started going downhill (just not interested in school) and started getting ranked in the high 30s until i hit rock bottom in class 9’s fall semester and i ranked last in class: 48th! I had failed pretty much every subject except Art :D. I was a confirmed failure and had pretty much started contemplating starting work at our car mechanic’s garage as per my father’s threats.
During the winter holidays that year, out of sheer boredom i started going through my sister’s old math notebooks. As i read all the math problems that she had done it turned out that math wasnt that bad at all. Infact it was a bit too easy. That was the initiation of my renaissance, but i hadnt really realized it. As the winter semester progressed, it dawned to me that physics was no different than math and i started doing good at it too. Basically i had sort of discovered the connection between every subject in class.
The actual moment when i realized that i wasnt that dumb afterall, came one fine school day morning. Physics was taught by a Sri Lankan tamil prof called Mr. Lokanathan, aka Loka. Loka was the only prof in school with an actual sense of humour. He was the perfect teacher. Made teaching fun and interactive which made learning easier and he was a great guy outside class too. But that didnt mean he was any less strict in class. One day we had a physics class right after a chemistry lab. One of the guys in class was still wearing his lab coat. He looked like that kid doogie howser MD from TV so i called him that. He got pissed and complained to Loka. And Loka kicked me out of the class. Now that was an important class because he was going over material for a physics test the very next day.. and i missed it all. That day after school i immersed myself in books and made sure i knew everything for the test. Except for one really important part that i just couldnt get.
Next morning i went to school about an hour early in the hopes of catching Loka and getting him to explain the part i couldnt understand. Luckily i did catch him and asked him the questions and he quickly explained it all on a piece of paper. Just before i left he goes (referring to the previous day’s incident of me getting kicked out of class) “*Sharjeel why do you do this? I have such high regard for you.. *”
Wow!! That was the first time in my life i had heard an honest commendation from someone important. That one line made my day and the next few years. Winter semester of class 9 i ranked 15th in class. Talk about a jump.. 48th to 15th in one semester! Next couple of years i was back in the top 5’s and eventually graduated from O’Levels (equal to N.American high school diploma) with 2 A’s (math and physics) and 5 B’s.
So that was one defining moment of my academic career, but that didnt keep me from messing it up big time later and i still have to figure out how to fit back university in my life.
Theres a few other moments but more on them later.
There are 2 defining moments in my life when i had to collect and redefine myself from the brink of failures to success.
I have been in top 3 or 5 during school days until grade 8, then i think thats where i started downward journey, got average one A+ in chemistry and rest all in B. in FSc got again average grades enough to get me to BSc, where i done worst of my career gone below average and hit the C and D's.
Watching all this my father asked me if i really want to continue like this then its better you join Rangers as Inspector he had sorted out this for me.
and really that was my definig moment, cause i hated to be such position. I tooke one week to decide what I need to do, re appeared in BSc exams, got good grades this time.
Got admission in MSc Chemistry, and Computer Science but opted for CS. and Thank to Allah I really got into and became high acheiver in almost every module i came across and i never looked back. That grades paid off and I was offered a high flyer job in my last semester.
Second came in my second Msc in UK when i was dragged down by few asian student around me, getting D in one module raised alarams, and i stricktly stopped group studying with them cause i couldnt do much and wasted time by explaining them basic concepts.
That also paid off and I completed final thesis well in advance, though it was hard because one of them really accused me that I didnt help him and he completed Msc on last chance in 5 Years instead of 1.
Now I think i need 1 more to leep forward in my career.
Umar bhai, amazing. u always inspire with ur educational anecdotes and sayings. :>
i'd try to post something like this, but not nearly as good from my own beginnings of teaching & research profession.
Dushwari
That first taste of triumph
I was around 16 years old at the time, and was preparing for my A-Level exams in Business, Physics and Mathematics. I had a friend who was doing the opposite – a happy-go-lucky lad who knew how to have fun even at the most stressful of times. About a month before the exam time, it hit him that he wasn’t prepared at all, and he approached several teachers at the school for help, and contaceted various tutoring centers. Everyone had declined to take him on with such a short timeline. Dejected and disheartened, the guy was about to cancel his exams and was ready to spend another year to prepare for them. Upon my insistence, he agreed to persist with his original plans and I tried to help by inducting him on a rather intensive study schedule. We would spend all-nighters in the school classrooms (got to know the watchman there rather well), utilize the library in our spare classes, and work away at my home over the weekends.
Of course we both knew that the guy is far lagging to be able to achieve marvels in the exams, but by the end of it all, he ended up with Bs in the two courses that I helped him with. He was ecstatic and appreciative... a couple of teachers in our school commended us for our hard work and I got nominated the student of the year for not giving up on this guy whom other teachers had shunned.
I still remember the feeling of anxiousness when I was waiting for my friend outside the British Council office where he went to find out his results, and the emotion of gratification when he told me his grades. I think that was my first defining moment, and here I am today teaching as a University Professor at the undergraduate and graduate levels.
definitely, academia is my calling.[FONT="]
with more education, i feel that i learn the best from my students.
when at the end of the semester, a student who has worked hard, comes to me, with a genuine request to give him/ her some more time, to finish writing the final paper, i consider their track record in the course in meeting other course requirements and if they were good, then, i will happily be reasonably easy with them.
but, if i see a student who thinks that he/ she can get away with minimum input and quality work, and has no respect for their own impression as a college senior, i am a tough grader.
my hope is that i always balance, my subjective impression of my students and their caliber and never inadvertently deal with any student in an unfair way.
what keeps me looking out for betterment in my students' understanding of the course material, is a sincere hope for making them aware of the tools of becoming self sufficient analyzers.
the quest for inquiry will never cease, as long as honest and hard working students are acknowledged for what they are good at - learning.
& my professional obligation in kind is to keep on doing - well, better and best teaching :>
i am looking forward to another teaching appointment this semester.
college classroom is always a stage for maximum impact - dealing with the next generation of educators, researchers and psychologists, is a good feeling, when they begin to see their text books, in the light of effective teaching and explicatives, it brings a very fullfilling sense of achievement to me as their instructor.
