Though I hadn’t realised this at the time, by far the most damaging part of being in the wrong program in the long term was that I had essentially nothing in common with any of my classmates. I’ve heard that it is not unusual for people to form lifelong friendships during their undergraduate years, but I barely interacted with anyone else in the program. Their goals were completely different from mine, as were their attitudes towards learning.
While there were a few guys at the top of the class who were actually passionate about some specific subject, most of the rest of the class wanted only to memorise enough equations, and for long enough, to pass their tests and do well on their assignments. More than once, I have heard, “What are you still studying that for? We don’t need to know that any more (or, until the final exam).” I suppose that this isn’t a problem specific to engineering… » [Expand post] [Permalink]