>>P.s. Helaine - I'd love to know where you found an MS program that >>takes
>>your lib arts background into account.
The masters program that I am in that takes it into account that I have a
liberal arts degree is at DePaul University in Chicago. The University of
Chicago also allows liberal art BA's into their Master's program. DePaul's
program is very long since you have to take a lot of prerequisites but most
of them are specially made for computer science grad students. That helps.
>>The big turning point for me was my senior year of college when I >>went
>>crazy and decided to take Calculus I - after not having taken >>math in
>>any form for four years, and during a time when I was also >>working on my
>>history thesis. I too thought about changing my major to science or CS a
>>million >>times, but never did. I took Calc because I missed using my
>>brain >>in that way, it was completely unrequired, and it was something I
>> >>could do entirely for myself.
>>I was scared when I failed the pre-test, but I knew it wasn't >>because I
>>couldn't do math, I was just rusty. So I stuck with it.
Yes- it all starts with those math classes, doesn't it? It's a huge deal to
get through them. Nicoya, I can't believe you just took Calculus I your
senior year. How brave was that!!! Calculus scared me to death so I prepared
for about a year with a private tutor. I felt pretty stupid going to a tutor
at the age of 25 and studying algebra, pre-calculus and trig but I figured
there was no other way. It worked and I made it through all the initial math
classes like calculus and discrete math.
>>I had one of the most amazing teachers ever, Prof. Kardos, a >>Hungarian
>>woman who had studied with some of the great >>mathematicians of Hungary
>>(who had worked with Paul
>>Erdos). It was wonderful to see a woman get so excited about a subject
>> >>which is so often considered the province of men. I proved a lot >>to
>>myself at that point, and it was shortly thereafter that I bought my own
>>computer.
There is no way I would be working in the computer field or getting this
masters degree in computer science if it weren't for a few women who
mentored me and told me I could do it. One woman in particular who hired me
for a sys admin job before I had any production experience was really
instrumental. She helped me learn my job and she allowed me to page her with
questions when I was under pressure. I called her all the time at really
weird times in the morning and night with questions. She never complained.
She just helped me out with problems. If it weren't for her then I would
have never been able to keep that first job because those guys (all male
environment) I worked with were totally on my case with questions like "How
did you get this job?", "You have a liberal arts degree?", "Why did Kelly
hire you for this job?", "Where did you work before?", "You don't know how
to reboot a server...?".... They were tough and it's true that I didn't know
what I was doing back then but everyone has to start somewhere and since a
couple of them didn't go to college then I would have to say someone gave
them a chance to figure it out at some point in their career. Those guys
were jerks and they would have done that to anyone, male or female, but I
know that for me it was hard to put up with it because I'm a bit sensitive
or something. Who knows - but it was tough and without that woman's help I
probably would have quit. She was very advanced in her career so she was not
working with me directly. She was like research and development and I was
1st level server support for an environment with 50 novell servers.
Helaine
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