College sucks, when does it get good.

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I'm attending my first semester at a small college at the moment and it's crap. The subjects I'm studying are lame and almost impossible to focus on, I can devote hours upon hours of studying and still end up ass all.

What should I do? Is college supposed to be this boring?

The good thing about college is you have a choice. If you don't like the subjects you're studying, you can choose to take different ones next semester. In the meantime, just do the best you can.

It only gets interesting when you get into subjects in your interest area (which I assume is you major). I would advise getting into areas of your major as quickly as possible and spacing out your basics or other required classes that are not in your interest area. This may mean taking 3/4th year courses your second year and 1st year courses your 4th year. If there is an elective or special course that just really fits your interest area take it when it is offered as that will give you something in a semester that you like.

Looking back on my college experience as an aspie, I would limit how many classes you take total to no more than 15-17 hours (with 17 only if 3 of those are labs) and no more than 9-11 of classes outside your interest area.

It never gets better. It sucks, and you're paying a lot of money for it. I say this close to the end of my fourth year in college, with a 3.85 GPA, and probably another year and a half left to go as a math major.

I say this not to get you down and screw you up, but I think if people had told me their opinions of this nature early on I would have thought about all the ways I could work the system. Instead, I kept plodding through, miserable all the time, because people will keep telling you it gets better when you get to this or that level, but it never has for me. Each level comes with a whole new set of frustrations.

And I took a year off. I can still say for certain that I learned more in that year about life and how to live and survive than any other time I can remember. And all that I know about myself now I can say I learned within that year. I made a lot of mistakes in that time, but I experienced a lot of incredible things that influenced my choice of major when I came back (because I have loans I cannot get defered unless in school)

My first semester of college was rather stressful and I enjoy it now more than I did at first (I liked the classes but just stressed over my grades too much). I think the experience is probably very different for everyone, also depending upon the particulars of the school. My experience is that school itself doesn't change so much as the student does. You might develop an interest in a subject though and that can make all the difference.

If your interest is a course area and you have already studied it a lot, then the first early courses you have to take in your interest area are going to be boring and painful. I already knew everything in the first to biology courses but could not test out of them because they were in my major, but when I got into the later courses it was fun. College did not change but I was learning stuff I liked. I also got involved in research because that gets you involved in what you like to do.

If you have an interest in a course area, find a professor who does research in that field and ask if you can help. Even outside of the sciences all professors are expected to publish (which means researching) regularly. You may just be a paper lackey at first but you get to learn tons about your interest area. If you like to travel you might also get to travel to conferences in that area of expertise.

If you find the subjects "lame and almost impossible to focus on", why the hell did you choose them, may I ask?

Some states have board of regents specified "Core Curriculum" that you have no alternative but to take. That's how it is in my state.

I have some latitude as to what I can take as far as electives, but there are certain pre-requisites I have to take in order to open up other choices. For instance, I cannot do any Literature classes at all, until I've completed two Composition classes. I cannot take any earth science (geology, meteorology) until I've completed a math class, which *I* cannot do until I've completed my two semester remedial Math program which is preparing me for advanced Math that I will never take.. and also threatens to basically ruin my college career because the school cares more about it than the classes I have A's in (which is all the rest of them). I cannot take my 1002 level Foreign Language (E.G. The one that counts towards my graduation reqs) until I've completed the 1001 level class which doesn't count. I cannot graduate without taking public speaking and two P.E. Classes.

Just another for instance, if some one is going to major in Math, or to be an engineer, it doesn't really make sense to force them to take public speaking, Literature, History or Composition classes.. let alone things like Art or Film History.. but they are just as required by some schools/states as my dreaded math class is for me as a social sciences major.

Some private schools, and some states, and even some other countries, all have vastly different requirements set down for students.. it really varies to heavily to try and figure out all the permutations.

Core Curriculum, like the other dude said. That's why bro.

Very weird. College is American university right? I would have thought you did one subject to get a degree.

College did not exactly work out for me...so I ended up dropping out of a four year college, trying at a community college and even dropping out of that. for a number of reasons
-I did not want to keep taking loans I probably can't afford
-I can't even pass remedial college math with a tutor, and I think for all degrees you need to at least pass basic math..unless there is some way around math I don't know about.
-I couldn't focus due to life stress and psychological issues.
-I came to the conclusion I'd give up on it, and find a better way to spend my time...still working on that.
So yeah I mean its really up to you what you want to do, I imagine once you get through the core classes or whatever and can have more choice of what classes you take it might be more intresting.....other then that though if you need college to reach your goals in life and its helping with that I'd say just keep trying and do your best. But if worse comes to worse there are other options besides college like you could go to a technical school if theres a skill you want to learn or you could always just try and find a job but that is much easier said then done especially in this economy.

US University/College is structured differently than that.

Typically, US college/University is designed to build "Well Rounded" Individuals who have a "Major" and a "Minor" or in some cases Two Majors, ( I think they call these Firsts in the UK) but you more or less spend your first 2 years (of 4) concentrating on "Core Curriculum" such as Composition, Maths, in a lot of instances basic Humanities classes, Public Speaking, P.E. etc.

I find it onerous in the extreme because it doesn't allow you to focus on your strengths but almost seems to be designed to allow your weaknesses to pull you under.

It's best just to try to get through. Then when the next semester comes, choose what you like. You're luckier than me because I was an idiot whowent along with the flow of his classmate and ending p with classes he didn't like. You're a freshman, you have 3 years to get to choose, I only have one left with no choice.

I'm in the same footsteps, but close to finishing my junior's. There's one class I don't like: Adobe Flash animation. Though I was turned on by flash back in 6th or 7th grade (back when it was still owned my Macromedia as Flash 5), seeing a friend do a cool simple "this or that" game, I was interested in it. But for now, not only i can't seem to get along with Flash, but also Flash at the moment is facing it's own extinction. Several web graphics companies here have ditched it for HTML5. My only choice is to pass this class so I can get my degree and be qualified as a normal human being of society.

If I could choose, I would choose to master Dreamweaver in which I'm also struggling, but because I know that Dreamweaver is the basis of making HTML, it keeps me motivated to take my time to learn it, unlike Flash which is on the verge of being phased out. But I have no choice but to fight though the hell of a Flash class.

Good luck..

That sounds like an utterly stupid way to get a degree, especially considering you pay so much for the privilege of being there. Come over the UK instead, it'll probably be cheaper too

Thanks for the advice folks, I plan to change my major to something along the lines of my interests next semester so it's no big deal currently but I feel like I'm grinding my life away at High School again. It's like eating eggs everyday for 12 years and then trying to cram eggs down your throat for two more or so.

Believe me, I would love to. In addition to being more specific in the graduation requirements and cheaper, Your schools actually offer what I want to study to boot. But alas, it isn't that easy. Though my US Federal Financial aid would pay for the tuition (which is extremely reasonable in comparison even after the recent price hikes) I'd effectively have to pay for all of my living expenses totally out of pocket. Which would mean loans for a great deal of it, as student visas only allow you to work 20 hours a week.