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Ask HN: What do you wish you'd known when you were 18?

12 points by ElliotH ↗ HN
I've just started university massively overconfidently and have ended up more behind on my work than I should be. That will be under control with some hard work that I'm now started on but I'd like the thoughts of others on HN.

I wouldn't say I've been given the huge shock that people warn of, but I've certainly been shown that the work to stay on top is going to be a lot harder than I had thought. It took me about 5 weeks to get to realising that. I can't help but think I'd be doing better right now if I'd realised that at the start.

So, feeling significantly humbled and ready to accept advice, I'd like to know you wish you'd known.

Thanks for your time.

16 comments

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[dead] grandalf
1) Take fewer classes, even if it means being part time, and obtain a grade of A or A+ in each one. A killer transcript should be a huge goal.

2) Take a semester off to travel. Seeing the third world up close was totally mind-bending for me.

3) Get serious about exercise and nutrition. You'll feel and look better, get smarter, and just overall be more of a "winner" that others respect.

4) Do small projects as "warmups". Don't let your current weaknesses stop you from jumping in and doing a startup or starting a side project. Learning by doing is fun.

5) Avoid credit cards and debt like the plague. It seems like it will be trivial to pay off $20K or $40K (or much more) of debt after graduation, but it's not. Debt will cramp your style a lot and make you far, far too risk-averse at a young age.

6) Consider getting a job that simply pays you to study. There are jobs like this which at first seem boring and devoid of learning, but in fact they are the secret to successful employment while in college, and will help you snag those A+ grades while earning some extra money.

7) Realize that as a young, motivated person you have the power. Don't let any older person intimidate you or make you feel less powerful. All they have is swagger and cynicism. They are scared of you.

8) If a class stinks in the first few meetings, trust your gut and drop it immediately. Be picky about how you spend your academic time/money.

9) Find good mentors. This applies to people of any age.

makecheck
Take very good lecture notes, and do not miss a single class. Sometimes, entire mid-term exam questions pull from an obscure point in one lecture. Sometimes, the recommended textbook will just suck. Sometimes, you will need reference material a year from now. Good notes will save you.

Overwhelming as it may already be, treat all assignments as the bare minimum. Professors do not babysit, they do not care if you do the 5 problems they suggested. Do 20 problems with your friends, and ask questions. Yes, you won't have as much time for fun, but you will be much happier when you see exam questions that you can fly through.

fezzl
"You don't know what you want in life. Don't pretend to just because parents, teachers, or friends expect you to know what you want to be. Make it your priority to learn as much as possible about all the options open to you, make a convicted choice, then scale from thereon."
rick_2047
I entered university knowing exactly what I wanted to do. "I want to be an engineer" I said.

One month in I made a demo robot for my robotics club "I want to work in the field of robotics".

Over the course of the first semester I organized 3 big events "Maybe I should get an MBA, I am good at this".

One month into the second semester I started getting good ideas about one start up Idea I had had for quite a while "Entrepreneurship is the way to go for me. I want to be my own boss"

Around the mid terms of the third semester I worked on a position paper titled "A memory model for object oriented computer architecture for a international conference (still waiting for the results for acceptance, pray for me :) ). It has been appreciated by my professors and Dr Ramesh Karne from who's Ideas I was inspired. "I am good at this, may be I should continue in the academic life and do research."

At the end of the third semester I wrote this --> http://www.lifeasparesh.co.cc/2010/10/my-confused-state-of-m....

I entered college/university with a confidence that I know what I want and that has been shattered when I expanded my knowledge.

silvestrov
Distinguish between base knowledge and tangential knowledge. Within computer science:

a) base knowledge is knowledge that is required to get an understanding of how things work: e.g. O-notation, (notion of) difference between mean running time and worst case. Mythical Man-Month. If is very important spending time learning this kind of knowledge.

b) tangential knowledge is knowledge you always can read up on at a later time (on a job) when required to: APIs, sort algorithms, including knowing how quicksort works. It is very often a waste of time learning tangential knowledge.

The more you get into academica, the more work you are presented with, and it will be more than you will ever be able to do. You need to be intelligent about where you apply (most of) your effort so you get the most bang for the buck. If you spend too much time learning tangential knowledge, you won't learn the base knowledge and will end up worse than if you slacked but focused on base knowledge.

Whenever you are presented with work, ask yourself: will doing this provide me with more understanding, or is it just more of the same I've already done. You are not given work just to do the work, you are given the work as an opportunity to learn.

tl;dr: If a part of your homework doesn't make you learn anything, there is no reason performing it.

kunjaan
This is a very very bad advice. I almost feel like hitting you for this.

DO NOT JUDGE HOMEWORKS. DO NOT SEPARATE knowledge into "base " and "tangential" especially when you are learning something in a course because many times th so called "tangential knowledge" is there to reinforce your "base knowledge".

I will take an example that you gave. If a student takes Algorithm design class, you would separate the class into the core design principles as "base" and the other as "tangential". However, the concrete algorithms are there to reinforce the design principles, to describe the abstraction layers that we have built etc. If a student doesn't work hard to learn about the working of the algorithm, he would probably miss out on important aspects like the power of invariance, the power of recurrence, the hurdle in analyzing the recurrence, the nonintuitive correctness of these algorithms. These are all implicit knowledges. The teacher would probably just mention it and move on in the lecture.

But the assignments, the problem sets, the midterm, the final exam are there to reinforce all these small lessons that would probably be missed. DO NOT JUDGE HOMEWORKS. As a student you may have no idea about what is important and what is not. Even if you feel you are not learning anything, do them, redo them, revise them and perform well in them. You never know the skills that you may pick up along the way that will make you a better computer scientist.

tl;dr

If you seriously doubt the purpose of the assignment, ask the teacher or the TA.

mathgladiator
I wish I knew about ego and humility.

I ran into my own version of "curse of the gifted" ( http://www.vanadac.com/~dajhorn/novelties/ESR%20-%20Curse%20... ) where I was finding myself re-inventing every wheel imaginable. IDE? yep, made my own. SCM? yep, made my own. Game engine? yep, made my own. [tech x], made my own. Were anything really good? in their own way, but they sucked more in others.

Why? my ego was out of control with a massive dose of "Not Ivented Here"

willheim
A diploma/degree is just a piece of paper. It's what went into it that will give it meaning. Make sure your diploma is meaningful.
znt
1- The importance of having a vision for my future and determining a path to that goal.

2- The male-female courtship dynamics.

These two would have helped me avoid lots of headaches.

pasbesoin
Exercise. It provides some balance to many other things, including via an increased sense of well being and enhanced concentration.

Exercise in ways you genuinely enjoy. (For me, it was cycling.) Drudgery begets sloth.

(This is one point of advice, not intended to be the whole enchilada.)

anthonycerra
Here are some things to consider in regard to the college experience as whole:

1) If you spend more time learning something on your own outside of your major take a step back and reevaluate your path.

2) Networking now is as important as it will ever be.

3) Don't commit to a long term relationship with someone. Be 18.

4) Hang around people you admire and are smarter than you.

5) Really enjoy the experience because you only get to be an undergrad once.