Posted by alexandra_k on June 25, 2015, at 23:30:52
In reply to Re: 1 down, 3 to go, posted by alexandra_k on June 13, 2015, at 21:02:07
1 semester down, 1 to go.
I don't really know how I went. Even when I find out my grades... I expect the only thing that can be taken from it, really, is 'need to keep on and do better if at all possible'.
I know I get.... Sort of transiently psychotic. Not sure psychotic is the thing, exactly. People... Tell me that I'm probably right (the stuff I'm 'psychotic' about is probably true). So... I can't tell how much they are just sort of humoring me in an effort to help me recover back to more normal faster, or how much they genuinely do think what I'm saying is probably true. My keyworker person said I was scaring her, at one point. Because it is stuff people don't want to think about... In that way... So... Maybe it is more about that. The issue is more that I get intently focused on it and kind of wound up. Some sort of feeling of significance about it which has me focused... Anyway... A couple days and it passes... So...
Anyway...
BIOSCI... I think I got the hang of things better as the course progressed. Learned a lot about how to study for the assessment. Which involved learning the content, yeah, but in a differently focused way to what I was used to. I really enjoyed the class. It is meant to be a lead in to MEDSCI next semester... Sort of feeling cautiously hopefully slightly optimistic about how the exam went. Fingers crossed... I do hope I'm starting to get the hang of it.
CHEM... Done now. Yeah. Fingers crossed I get no less than a B-... Hopefully B... Fingers crossed for a B+. A B+ would make me so very happy, yeah. I dunno... I felt the exam went a lot better than the previous assessments - but the previous assessments went very poorly indeed and I don't know that I did well enough in the exam to recover particularly.
Population health... Sucks. Really. I mean, aspects of the subject matter are genuinely interesting to me... But I really didn't like the courses at all. The core one was better... The other one was horrible. Really horrible. And I did poorly. 35% first essay. 30% second essay. only just scraped a pass on the 10% in tutorial group multi-guess. All of this is... Surprising. I've never failed an essay in my life. I mean, I've recently had problems passing things with equations / algebra / calculus in them, but that's not surprising given my educational background. Failing a first year essay?
I applied to have someone independently re-mark it. That was a process... Population health is... Taught out of this satellite campus. It's basically on a chunk of land that was (is?) Maaori land. It is a 'health science' campus. Because the main health problems are with Maaori and there are equity issues and so on and so forth... And because lots of kids want to be doctors (because they watch soap operas on TV and so on) and while they don't get high enough grades to do the bio-med pathway to medicine they let them into the health science pathway (the one that I'm doing). Only... I'm not part of their equity group, am I. They don't want me to do well... Their kids... They've picked them out already. The socially gregarious bullies, of course. They won't show us the best examples of essays they got... So we can see what they are looking for... THey won't give us more detailed feedback on the multi-guess quiz (so we can ensure they graded them properly instead of pulling our marks out of their butts).
It is traumatising for me... Because much of my life... It isn't a Maaori thing, exactly. It isn't a culture thing, exactly. Only.... It sorta kinda is... But lots of non Maaori people have it and it isn't essential to Maaori culture at all... Its an attitude... I had all the way through primary school and High school. An attitude I found with my Maaori carers when I was placed in foster care. An attitude I found at tech. At the uni across the bridge. At my accommodation out there (in association with a supposedly elite Maaori secondary school / the university out there) and I find it now, here, too.
Imagination???
Very first day was an orientation thing. So they get us all in a lecture theatre. Activities. Stand back to back with the person next to you and when they yell out the emotion word turn and face each other and pull that emotion.
Get into tutorial groups and throw the ball to someone and say your name. And then after some time of that throw the ball to the person whose name you call.
Lets play with the autistic girl?
?
Yeah.
Then multiple choice test. Instead of doing it normally (printing off the questions and we mark our answers on the page) and we get 5 minutes... All the curtains must be closed. All the flourescent lights must be turned on. The questions must be overhead projected onto the wall. The tutor must stand right next to the questions (so the questions can't be viewed without her bobbing smily face in the same frame). The tutor must give time cues '30 seconds, 10 seconds' and move onto the next question after 60 seconds (only one question displayed at a time). And all the rest of it must be group work.
I feel like they have intentionally tried to wind me up / trigger me from day one. INforming them of my disability meant that they intentionally targeted me negatively. How is that not bullying? If you want to interact with someone and they make it clear to you that they are busy (working) and you feel that it is acceptable for you to disrupt their work (punish them for not paying attention to you on demand) by kicking at the back of their seat and so on... How is that not bullying?
Beam me up, scotty.
The upshot is that I don't know whether I'm even going to pass their paper. The exam was worth 50% but I was doing pretty f*ck*ng badly indeed before going into the exam. I need to trust that the academic board will put the brakes on things if they try and fail me (if I fail then there is no way my GPA can recover from that). Even if they C- or C+ me there is basically no way that my GPA can recover from that. they know i can't function in their environment (there is no f*ck*ng way i'm going to go live with them / help them). i can't function in their environment. they certainly aren't interested in giving me any power (so i could actually help them) they're more interested in the people who can smile giggle flirt make them think they will stay... only to genuinely screw them over at a later date. it's a sort of... attraction to being f*ck*d over. anyway... there is nothing that i can do about any of that because they simply will not let me function. so...
I have to hope the academic board will step in. i tried to write a nice exam... because i guess if there is a sticking point they will ask to see it. i guess they also have the power to view OTHER exams. that will be the thing, really. i know full well they have a lot of basically illiterate people in the class... so... it shouldn't be too hard to put the brakes on their failing me. i don't know that i can trust the process... especially given my more recent (bad) performance in physics... need for someone to see that algebra / calculus for me is a very different bag from health science out at the campus where they've realised they can make money off of people by offering them a pathway into medicine that seems mostly designed to f*ck people over / waste their time / set them up to fail. except for the few maaori students they select to A+ so they can help them cross the application criteria threshold then TAS them a place...
they're tarteging me because i'm eligable for TAS admission, too. and (autistic stereotypes they'd be most knowledgeable in given their performance thus far) they probably think i'd do well enough in chem / bio for failing me to be their only way of obstructing my getting a place.
anyway...
round 2 next semester. sequal paper. have to do it.
also MEDSCI. which should be great. everyone says it is wonderful. more like med school than anything we've done thus far. huge chunk of it is multiguess because the major med school exams are so.... simply have to learn to do well at that. and the other LAW paper which is.. the equivalent paper for law school, really. statute interpretation and the like. i'm thinking that will be fun for me and i'll be reasonably good at it. i mean... in reading the textbooks i can ancitipate their next point and so on.. it is just very logical and straightfowards, i think...
i think the UMAT will be important. because the people who write that are (I think) the people who write the medical school multi-guess. Our equivalent of the STEP exams. So... We need to do well at their way of thinking / their multi-guess. If I do well at that... I really don't think they will give a f*ck about how sh*t I do at Tamaki.
I don't know. Lets see how badly they manage to f*ck me over this time. I mean... Story of my life, hey. Only trouble was they didn't get to me early enough. Cot death and all that. I mean a kid whose natural / automatic response is to cringe away when we shriek and giggle and squeal and squawk at it?
I suppose I might be transiently psychotic about this / them... I do think that a number of things they have done are straight out of the 'how to upset someone with autism' sort of stereotype from 20 years ago literature that they are probably familiar with...
i suppose they probably have the best intentions in the world. that is typically the problem... the whole 'the road to hell is paved with good intentions' thing. i saw this poster up out there on that campus. they wanted volunteers to play with this autistic boy. that's what got me thinking about how they were tormenting me with the same things. but of course... honestly... they probably dind't know that it is tormenting. they have no comprehension that being raped... anything... any knid of physical contact against someones will can be tormenting. there is no comprehension that someone might have a will that involves less person contact. how can that be? A will for another person to back off. i don't think that makes sense to them. or... it is like teaching a dog to stay... you need to start out with 3 seconds and then reward. and then 30 seconds and then reward. and it is a huge f*ck*ng path to things like just being able to do your own f*ck*ng thing without praising people for not crowing you all the f*ck*ng time...
anyway...
their thing is that the more time you spend with them the more you will learn how well intentioned they are and the more empathy you will develop for them.
but i know that is not true at all in my case. the less time i spend with them the more i'm able to focus on the relatively removed things like the history of injustice they have suffered and current inequities in policy and so on... these things make me feel more empathetic towards them. i am able to feel empathy and understanding for their communication style (and so on) when my whole body isn't screaming out to me from being physically tormented which is what inevitably happens when i spend much time with them.
or my mother. huh.
or, anyone, really.
jeez.
i think i might skip lectures next semester. listen to them online. the multiguess quizes are immediately after (no time to study after attending - you wouldn't want to reward people for studying because that would mean punishing their own kids who are too busy socialising to study)... no time to listen to the lecture recordings before the test. again... can't reward people for doing work when we are about rewarding the people who value socialising above work.
it's hard to find kids who are acceptable to their people who are capable of passing the australian medical councils multiguess. for sure.
my worry is... there are probably more than a few who would do great. if only it wasn't for things like cot death. huh.
i feel sad. i'm not racist. really. genuinely. i do have a lot of empathy. i have lived with them a lot. i have tried to help... what limited power i had... when i couldn't function in their environment at all. i tried to help them understand what i needed.. i tried to help them understand how aspects of that might help them do better in things they might want (e.g., having a quiet study space might help them focus on the work)... and they didn't want to know. they were just hating on me that i wasn't expressing sadness / remorse / regret that i couldn't just hang about with them socialising all day. if that isn't what you most want in the world...
alien. yeah.
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1076978
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20150604/msgs/1079986.html