A Painful But Correct Decision

I made a decision Saturday night. I am dropping linear algebra.

I'm getting an A in the class. The material is, with a reasonable amount of work, comprehensible to me. I'm getting the homework done. I can probably continue this way and get an A.

But I'll flunk sweprac. (This is "Software Engineering Practices," my senior experience course. It's a big group project.)

Linear algebra is simply consuming all of my available time. It doesn't help that I have a terrible professor. (It helps that Ed loves it, and helps me with it a lot. But this doesn't save me time, really - it just gives me a better understanding of the material. And something fun to do.) It really doesn't help that linear algebra homework is so much more straightforward than working on my sweprac project, and so much more deadline-driven, that at any given moment I am bound to choose it.

But sweprac is important. It's my senior experience course. It's only taught in the Spring. I really, truly do not want to have to re-take it. I also don't want to let down my professor - who is happy for me to finally have the positive group experience I've never had. And I really do have a fantastic team for the class. I owe them my effort, and it's also a great opportunity to really do something.

The idea of re-taking linear algebra another time sounds perfectly fun and delightful, so it's not a loss in that way. Maybe I'll even get a good professor next time.

So...goodbye, linear algebra. And hello, scary sweprac project!