the prompt is 2021 Q1
https://apcentral.collegeboard.org/media/pdf/ap21-frq-english-language.pdf?course=ap-english-language-and-composition
For centuries handwriting has been our primary source of documenting data, but is it still currently? With digital technology reaching into everyones' back pockets the decline of handwriting is evident. Email's have replaced letters, Word has replaced note taking, powerpoint has replaced posters, and many more. Even though handwriting is a great skill to have, and can help you with other aspects in life, its pragmatic uses are continuously declining. Thus it should not be focused on in school as a mandated class but rather as an elective.
Undoubtably, handwriting has major benefits, more than just the physical writing it self. Cursive script is proven to develop fine motor skills and improve mental organization (SOURCE D). Even though cursive handwriting has such benefits, the uses it posses in the everyday world are exponentially declining. What would be the point of focusing valuable education time on forcing every student to learn cursive? It would be absurd, if they want to do it, they can choose to in the form of an elective. It would be deranged to force woodworking kids to join the band, same applies here. Or it would be the same thing as forcing every student to learn French, Japanese, Spanish, and Arabic, indisputably learning many languages has great benefits to one's mind, but it should be a choice especially since it is not used in everyday life. Or as SOURCE E states, Super Mario Bros can develop better motor skills. Another important factor to consider on WHY we should make it optional is its [handwriting and cursives] roots. The real reason we adopted such writing habits in the 19th century was to make our national identity and our sense of uniqueness. We differed from other scripts not limited too but including the Gothic script, or the Palmer method because they were connoted to different cultures (SOURCE C), we adopted this so we can show we are different, however in todays world that matters very little because everyone has the same Sans Serif font in their inboxes (font gmail uses). Vouching the fact that we should not make it a necessity at school for children to learn at school.
Even though mandating such a dying subject could potentially revive it, there is no practical need to do so. Doing so would most likely do more harm than good. SOURCE B portrays one of the thousands of worksheets teachers would have to print for every student to strenuously practice their cursive writing. We all know that deforestation is hurting our climate. Badly. So why waste even more paper, especially on children who have no interest in learning the skill as well. It is like buying a $100,000 racecar for a student who has no interest in racing. What will it lead to? Immense waste. To reiterate. The printing of worksheets should be encouraged for children who want to learn the skill of cursive handwriting, but shouldn't be forced upon everyone. There would be no point in encouraging penmanship in school since post-school the focus is towards technology, after all school is meant to prepare us for the future (SOURCE A). Schools that are focusing on it should reconsider and put more effort into preparing the children for the future. In 2013, writing on paper was on average 2x than writing with technology (SOURCE F), that is however 11 years ago and if numbers like that are still prominent, school administration should reconsider.
The point of school is to be prepared for the future. In today's world penmanship is almost extinct, and in tomorrow's world it will be extinct. Technology is more efficient to use, saves the environment, and is the standard for today. So why force children in learning something that will not have technical use to everyone. It [cursive handwriting] should be more of an optional elective, like woodworking or coding.

Hey,
My father passed away a year and half ago due to lung cancer and I still have not been able to process it.
When I heard the news of my father's death my world was (and still is) in shambles. My father was everything to me, the only parent and family member I could laugh with nonstop and the only one who supported me no matter what. He believed in me more than he believed in himself. And despite dealing with addiction and major depressive disorder, he still managed to rise up and show his children love whenever he could. He was an adventurous person with a great sense of humour and he brightened not just my days but my entire life.
Now I lost him, and for the past year I've been numbing myself with addictions of my own to deal with the pain of it all. My thought process became much more disorganized, hazy, and confused (I rewrote this post many times because I could not get myself to think clearly). Whenever I remember him I can't help but fall into tears and dread.
I decided three days ago that I'd sober up, and meet with my pain face-front in order to actually heal. I looked up some grief worksheets in desperation for something that could teach me how to go about this since I've put that on pause for a year and a half.
I was hoping if anyone could share with me anything that has helped you process some of your grief. Especially on how to stop crying everytime I remember him. I want to speak about him with joy and share good memories of him with my friends. I am tired of crying all the time even when I'm speaking positively about him.
Thank you in advance, and much love to all of you trying to process your own loss <3

Illiterate ESL/Refugee Students
Hey everyone! I am a teacher in a very difficult situation that I am at a total loss in terms of how to navigate. It brings me a great deal of anxiety because I feel like it is an impossible task and that these kids are not getting what they need from me. I don’t know what I’m looking for here… I need to rant, I want advice, I want other people to share their experiences.
I teach at an inner city middle school with a large population of new immigrants and refugees, primarily from Somalia and central Africa. Some of the kids in my class are pre-literate. They cannot read or write in their native languages, they do not know their numbers, and many have NEVER attended school before. Their parents are also illiterate. Some of these kids could be best described as feral - they are quite violent and aggressive, and unable to function socially in a school setting, which makes sense given the circumstances they grew up in. There are lots of challenging behaviours to deal with on top of the academic issues.
When these new students arrive here, they are attending school for the first time and are thrown into a mainstream class. As one would expect, it is nothing short of disastrous. These kids are not getting the attention or help they need. I feel like I am ignoring them because I have 30 other students. When I do have the chance to work with them one on one, it is at the expense of my other kids’ learning because they require so much attention. I end up having to plan multiple lessons for a single class and I cannot keep up with it. There is no reason a teenager who does not know their letters is in a classroom with students who are writing essays. It is not fair to either group of students.
It is quite a sad situation and my heart goes out to these kids, but I am in no way qualified to deal with them. I am middle school trained and have a class with 30+ other students that I am expected to teach the middle school curriculum to. I am not a phonics teacher and do not know how to teach children how to read. I don’t even think that early childhood literacy strategies would work with teenagers learning to read for the first time. I also cannot translate worksheets into their native languages because they cannot read those either.
Funds have been mismanaged in my district so we do not have ESL classes and the consultants who come in once every few weeks expect you to focus all of your attention on your ESL kids, which is just not feasible.
I feel like I am just a babysitter for some of these kids and that they are not getting anything from being there. I just wish there were some transitional classes for newcomers when they arrived here. I’m in Canada, and we keep bringing in more and more refugees, but offer nothing in the way of supports.
What the hell do I do? I am so overwhelmed. Can a teenager even learn to read for the first time or have they surpassed that zone of development? How have you guys dealt with similar situations?

Hey everyone! I am a teacher in a very difficult situation that I am at a total loss in terms of how to navigate. It brings me a great deal of anxiety because I feel like it is an impossible task and that these kids are not getting what they need from me. I don’t know what I’m looking for here… I need to rant, I want advice, I want other people to share their experiences.
I teach at an inner city middle school with a large population of new immigrants and refugees, primarily from Somalia and central Africa. Some of the kids in my class are pre-literate. They cannot read or write in their native languages, they do not know their numbers, and many have NEVER attended school before. Their parents are also illiterate. Some of these kids could be best described as feral - they are quite violent and aggressive, and unable to function socially in a school setting, which makes sense given the circumstances they grew up in. There are lots of challenging behaviours to deal with on top of the academic issues.
When these new students arrive here, they are attending school for the first time and are thrown into a mainstream class. As one would expect, it is nothing short of disastrous. These kids are not getting the attention or help they need. I feel like I am ignoring them because I have 30 other students. When I do have the chance to work with them one on one, it is at the expense of my other kids’ learning because they require so much attention. I end up having to plan multiple lessons for a single class and I cannot keep up with it. There is no reason a teenager who does not know their letters is in a classroom with students who are writing essays. It is not fair to either group of students.
It is quite a sad situation and my heart goes out to these kids, but I am in no way qualified to deal with them. I am middle school trained and have a class with 30+ other students that I am expected to teach the middle school curriculum to. I am not a phonics teacher and do not know how to teach children how to read. I don’t even think that early childhood literacy strategies would work with teenagers learning to read for the first time. I also cannot translate worksheets into their native languages because they cannot read those either.
Funds have been mismanaged in my district so we do not have ESL classes and the consultants who come in once every few weeks expect you to focus all of your attention on your ESL kids, which is just not feasible.
I feel like I am just a babysitter for some of these kids and that they are not getting anything from being there. I just wish there were some transitional classes for newcomers when they arrived here. I’m in Canada, and we keep bringing in more and more refugees, but offer nothing in the way of supports.
What the hell do I do? I am so overwhelmed. Can a teenager even learn to read for the first time or have they surpassed that zone of development? How have you guys dealt with similar situations?

I hope this isn't a dumb question - I am the parent of a fourth grade girl who was diagnosed with dyslexia recently and this is all pretty new to me. I hope I'm missing something, actually, because I'm confused and pissed and sad.
This ended up being longer than my single question - I guess I am actually really pissed off and sad about the last nine months in general, and I am completely open to any feedback, advice, or ideas about what to do now and how to help my kid. This is the first time I wrote all of this down and the irony of writing a novel on a dyslexia subreddit is not lost on me.
I'm leaving it lol.
Cora has always been brilliant and weird and loud, but over the last few years, it became apparent that she was having a harder time....stopping. Stopping talking, stopping moving, stopping yelling - it was just endless and exhausting for everyone around her. (Except at school. She is and was perfectly behaved at school - she has literally never gotten so much as a note home about goofing off in class.) Cora hit a wall in third grade - the hyperactivity was finally wearing her out, too, and annoying her friends. She finally asked for some help slowing down.
She was tested for ADHD and the general host of common mental health conditions last fall, and to no one's surprise, was diagnosed with ADHD-combined type, as well as anxiety symptoms that the psychologist described as significant enough to warrant a GAD diagnosis…but that she strongly suspected were a perfectly rational reaction to the very real problems Cora’s impulsiveness caused in her life.
This was exactly my experience as someone diagnosed with ADHD as an adult. It turns out that the consequences of constantly losing my car keys, forgetting appointments, and impulsively spending money I didn’t have were making me anxious and stressed, not the other way around. I had expected similar results for Cora and I was glad this was happening now - she could skip the years of totally ineffective treatment and misdiagnoses that I went through before being diagnosed and successfully treated.
What we were not expecting at all was the additional diagnosis of "specific learning disorder with reading impairment" noted in the report. I had no idea what this meant. The psychologist did not use the word "dyslexia" in her written evaluation, a decision which resulted in another 8 months of confusion and (probably unnecessary) testing detailed below. She explained to us that Cora could have dyslexia, but that her testing wasn't granular enough to be sure - that there was a chance it was "something else" and the SLD diagnosis was an umbrella term that covered both dyslexia and conditions unknown. (I have no idea what she was referring to and the general weirdness about using the word dyslexia was something I noticed with the school, too. I am still confused by this and other interactions where I get the distinct feeling people aren’t telling me something important.)
It was almost September, so the psychologist recommended pursuing testing with the school; this seemed to be a reasonable next step. They would test Cora and determine exactly what was going on, if anything. This whole part of the report was very much characterized as an incidental finding - something to follow up on, but nothing alarming given Cora’s history of good grades.
"Maybe she was just tired after a long day of testing,” the doctor explained. “But it also seemed like she wasn't hearing certain letters correctly." Years of speech therapy had helped Cora correct all but a few minor issues - but combined with this potential reading issue, maybe an audiologist should test her again. Get her hearing tested, start medication for ADHD, and see what the school says about her reading - that was the plan, no big deal.
I wasn't worried, but I figured it couldn't hurt to see what other help was available. I learned that we have a branch of a big tutoring nonprofit in our city that offers Orton-Gillingham instruction at no charge - something I soon realized would cost hundreds of dollars per month at other centers. Free is good! I submitted Cora's application and the report from the psychologist (with the ADHD/GAD/SLD all clearly noted)….and we got a rejection letter a week later in the mail. Cora didn't qualify because the tutoring was specific to dyslexia, and the SLD with reading impairment was not the same as a formal dyslexia diagnosis. Fair enough, I thought - I figured we'd get the testing done through her school and could reapply if the result was a dyslexia diagnosis.
That....was naïve, lol. But the psychologist made it sound like a total non-issue, something schools did all the time. I sent the school psychologist and teachers the report before school even started, since surely they would want to schedule all of this right away! I didn’t hear anything for a few weeks – the start of the school year must be such a busy time, after all – but raised it again, report in hand, at a meeting with Cora’s teacher in late September.
“You….really want to try to avoid putting a label on things too quickly,” she told me, in a tone that implied there was much more that she was not saying. “She seems to be doing quite well in class. Let’s see how she does on the standardized tests we’re finishing this week and go from there.” I was definitely aware that I was missing something, but it seemed reasonable to wait for Cora’s test results if they would help inform next steps. Cora scored well above average, as usual; shortly after receiving these scores, the school psychologist emailed me to let me know that no further testing was warranted.
I still felt like I was missing something – spoiler alert, I was – but there didn’t seem to be anything else left to do. They're the experts and were totally unconcerned – only positive news - and Cora’s new ADHD meds seemed to be really helping. After that, everything did seem to be okay at school for a while. Cora liked her teachers and was doing well.
Everything was copacetic…except for the fact that Cora’s anxiety seemed to be getting worse without any tangible explanation. She complained about fourth grade being a lot harder, but again – her grades were fine, she was perfectly behaved, she liked her teachers….it was difficult to identify any problem that needed solving. Soon, Cora started getting home and isolating herself in her room for over an hour every day. She seemed stressed. Worn out. This went on for months.
And then she had her first panic attack on a Sunday night, seemingly out of nowhere. She wanted a mental health day Monday and was back in school Tuesday, seemingly her normal self.
The next Sunday, she had another panic attack, and this one was much, much worse. She lost control of her bladder. I was close to taking her to the ER. It was scary. That's when it all came out. She was DREADING school - her two hours of ELA in the mornings had become “torture.” She was white-knuckling it through the reading, writing, and spelling work, totally clueless as to why it seemed so much harder for her than for other kids, but so determined to get good grades that she had just burned. the. fuck. OUT.
She was home for days after this. The school tried to dismiss my concerns at first - it couldn't have been that bad, I was told. To be fair, my concerns were vague because I still didn’t understand the real issues or how to help Cora, either. Cora was clearly unwell and adamantly refused to return to school. I started putting everything in formal, written letters emailed to all of her teachers, the school psychologist, and everyone else who seemed potentially relevant. I told them I wasn't sending her back until they did something to try to figure out what was going on in ELA.
That was mid-February. We had a meeting before I would agree to send Cora back, where they talked about putting together the "interdisciplinary team" to conduct "extensive classroom observation.” They insisted that this process would take at least 60 days to complete. Cora reports that there have been three days where someone has essentially come to her ELA class and stared at her while she works.
We weren’t just waiting for the school, though. After the psych eval last summer, we had been slowly working through additional evaluations and appointments related to Cora’s hearing, speech, and language abilities. Basically, we were working our way from Cora's ears into different regions of her brain, trying to catch problems along the path that sound waves traveled - entering Cora's head as vibrations in her ear canals, winding into her brain as phenomes, assembling into a stream of recognizable words, converting into meaning in entirely different areas of her brain, and eventually emerging again via her speech. I had no idea so many tiny things could go wrong in that process, but they can - and we can get pretty damn granular in order to figure that shit out when there’s a potential problem. Cora had some weird results here and there - we now know that overlapping speech is basically her Kryptonite, which explains a lot of meltdowns at family gatherings over the years. But on the whole, her ears and her brain are doing fine, and she doesn't have autism, either.
We had been lucky to get hooked up with the best child development team in the area - they were wonderful, and the process of more testing and visits seemed to reassure Cora (and us, honestly) that there was more help on the horizon, more answers soon. She started low-dose Zoloft for the anxiety and seemed a little happier; her anxiety about school was starting to morph into resignation and frustration, which actually seemed healthier in a way. "It takes time," they tell us. Her breakdown was in February. They wanted to see the report from the most recent evaluations. Fair enough; although it is not lost on me that I am paying an outside team to do the school's job, at least it's getting done.
Two weeks ago, we finally got the team's report - and the written words, "developmental dyslexia." The lead psychologist is going to meet with the 504 team at her school - he is wonderful and immediately understood so many of Cora's concerns and needs. I'm not exactly optimistic, but it's at least possible that this may result in accommodations/extra help in school. Cora thinks he walks on water and is so excited that he's going to "stand up for" her.
The report is detailed and confirmed a lot of what we suspected. She's a really bright kid - IQ around 120 with sky high mathematics and nonverbal problem-solving scores. She apparently discussed "conundrums that are complex and abstract in nature" during her sessions, with a "recognition that there is not necessarily a solution" to these mysterious issues. (LMAO....this is my weird and wonderful kid.) The report describes Cora as "delightful" - funny, self aware, and highly motivated to learn.
Her reading comprehension score was in the 90th percentile, essay composition in the 70th - spelling scores came in at the 25th percentile, which was no surprise. Pseudoword decoding was poor - she's in the 14th percentile - and it got worse from there. Cora has an oral reading fluency in the 9th percentile, a basic reading score in the 7th percentile, and a word reading score in the 4th percentile.
In fact, the essay composition score was the only "average" score among dozens of measures of her reading, writing, and language abilities - comprehension was universally excellent and decoding was universally abysmal. It was hard to read. It felt like a gut punch - looking at the single-digit scores, I finally realized the insane degree of effort it must have taken to finish her work and look happy doing it.
The developmental psychologist leading the team told us that it was unusual to see that stark of a difference - that the severity of her impairments are usually associated with average comprehension scores at best. I have tried to wade through research about these instruments, but decided to take his word for it. Typically, the deficits in her basic reading skills would set off a chain reaction of lower scores down the line - but Cora had brought her grades and tests scores up from an already high start at the beginning of the year.
"It's no wonder her anxiety symptoms are increasing - she's completely exhausted," he said. "Imagine what she could achieve with the right kind of help."
I realized then why Cora's high scores and good grades, so impressive to everyone else, were such a source of consternation for her. That chain reaction was still happening, getting in the way of what she was actually capable of achieving. She knew it, even if the rest of us didn't - she could do better with the right kind of help.
I honestly feel sick thinking about it. She never told anyone she was struggling, never asked for help - not from us, not from anyone at school, heck not from her former-literacy-teacher grandma. No one had any idea. My husband and I had actually encouraged her to slow down a little in the weeks before her panic attacks, just out of a general sense that something was brewing despite her repeated insistence she was doing fine. Turn in the worksheet a day late, three sentences is plenty, relax. Unthinkable, Cora insisted, she was fine.
So she's back at school, nothing has changed other than the glacially slow 504 process of "observation" occurring in the background sometimes, but she seems to be a bit less stressed. I can't tell if getting pissed off about the situation is helping her deal with it, if the Zoloft is taking the edge off, or if she's just masking harder now. Maybe all three. 18 more days of school and Cora is counting. them. down. Her teachers and support staff seem generally bewildered by the idea she is or was ever struggling. They were caught totally off guard when I abruptly pulled her out of school until we at least got them to commit to the 504 process – but we had been blindsided too. They saw a happy kid who was thriving academically until her parents pulled her out of school and started a process that no one seems particularly committed to finishing. Sometimes I think they don't believe us at all. Maybe I would feel the same way in their shoes, I don’t know. I think they’ll listen to the doctor.
The entire point of this post, though, was to ask about Cora’s second rejection from the local tutoring program. With summer approaching and the diagnosis of dyslexia (versus maybe-dyslexia, maybe-whatever-else-could-be-included-under-the-SLD-“umbrella”, which I am still unsure is even a thing), I've been looking into all sorts of options for tutoring. Summer is a good opportunity to try to start getting Cora some meaningful help without adding yet another thing to her plate. She's excited. We can build some tools before next year - if we know what works for her, we can be better advocates from Day 1.
So I resubmitted Cora's application - I still had my original email and I just attached the shiny new report to that, explaining where to find the magic D word that I fully expected would finally open a door where Cora could get the right kind of help. This new report was more granular with reading testing, but the dyslexia diagnosis was the one really substantive change. It included Cora's ADHD and anxiety diagnoses, as did the report I submitted with our initial application, but with new information about medication and treatment for these issues - progress!
(I would like to point out at this point that ADHD and anxiety are firmly established as two of the most common comorbid diagnoses for kids with dyslexia, and that anxiety symptoms in particular can occur because of the challenges caused by dyslexia. My daughter had full-blown panic attacks at 10 years old largely because she struggles to FUCKING READ and no one was helping her. I know I am preaching to what little choir is likely left at this point in my novel. But especially as someone who was medicated/treated for depression and anxiety for 20 years before anyone agreed to test for, diagnose, and treat the ADHD symptoms that were causing me to regularly fuck up my life in really depressing and stressful ways…..this chicken and egg shit really hits a nerve.)
Anyhoo, it had taken 8 months and a lot of work, but I had finally done this one cool thing for her - Cora was going to get the right kind of help. The school year is almost over, but at least we had this one success. The obstacle that I’m still not sure was warranted in the first place – the lack of the word dyslexia in the initial evaluation – had been checked off what was now a giant list of obstacles in Cora's path.
And thanks to the generosity of people who had probably heard and experienced a lot of similar, frustrating stories, our family could focus on paying off the bills accumulated in the process of getting to this point instead of adding more to the pile. Free is always good, but sometimes free is a godsend.
Twelve hours later, Cora was denied again, this time via a brief email simply noting the GAD diagnosis in both reports. "Our tutors are not trained to work with children who are diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorders" and they "cannot meet her needs."
That was it. No further explanation. Just…fuck your anxious baby girl who is trying so hard and fuck you for trying. NEXT!
Oh, and P.S., fuck the really significant percentage of kids with dyslexia with comorbid anxiety diagnoses who are incredibly well researched and described in just…all of the fucking literature. Just all of it, honestly, for decades. Fuck those kids too.
People seem to treat the word "dyslexia" like it's the only thing that matters sometimes but also not something that should be ever said in other contexts, AND I'm pretty fucking sure that "SLD with reading impairment" is essentially equivalent to the word dyslexia because no one can explain what else might be under that "umbrella," and apparently it's nigh impossible to get meaningful help for my daughter through the public school systems anywhere in America, and giant nonprofits care about kids with dyslexia so much, but not the anxious ones, better lock the doors before those crybabies get their needs all over our tutoring center!
We will figure out how to pay for help for Cora, that’s a given.
But honest to fucking god, have you guys just been putting up with this shit the whole time? I'm so sorry.

Think this was the stupidest mistake I've made in my career.
I just got a message from my manager at Friday night at midnight; there was an issue with two comments I made for the management letter; the client did not recognize the loan contracts mentioned at all. Which makes sense since they were from a different client!!!
I uploaded the wrong client's worksheet into the auditfile without noticing. But what is probably worse; The reviewing manager did not notice. Neither did the partner notice and my remarks where copied into the management letter. Only after I had a discussion with the client who did not recognize the comments I made did my manager spot that this was the wrong worksheet.
I just fixed it at 1 AM. I feel very stupid for this mistake, first time it happened to me. At least the manager didn't seem angry with me since he is aware he and the partner also dropped the ball by not bothering to even check if the worksheet matches at all with what's known about the client. And luckily the name from the client wasn't mentioned in the screenshots shared with the client so it's not a breach of information.
Anyway, terrible start to the weekend. That's for sure.

2024-172 / Zedd MAP: 98.54 / MLZ MAP: 97.44 / Score Gap: 1.10
Wikipedia?wprov=sfti1#) / IMDb / Official Trailer / Our Collection
“Holy crap…” ((gets out of chair)) “Goddamn it…” ((starts pacing, wipe my face with my hand)) “For the love of all that’s good and holy…” ((the dogs get involved, confused - am I initiating play, is someone at the door - I’m rapidly blinking, snapping my fingers in front of my face)) “fuck me, Mrs. Lady Zedd - I gotta go outside” ((not the way you’d expect to start a Robert Altman film write up - unless (of course), you’ve watched a Altman film with me in person))
From IMDb: Private investigator Philip Marlowe helps a friend out of a jam, but in doing so gets implicated in his wife's murder.
Believe me, don’t believe me - it’s your prerogative ((shrug)) the truth is, at least 50% of any movie you watch happens between your ears - it’s what you bring to the table that counts - I’m upgrading it to 51% ((wink-wink)). You’re going to see what you expect to see, and that’s largely a product of where you come from, what you’ve experienced in life, you’re mental disposition, how you believe life works.
You sit next to someone and 49% of the movie is shared between you - what’s on the screen, from there it’s completely personal… and I take motion pictures very personal. On a film where the sights and sounds make sense to me - it’s like a portal opens up and I’m projected into the story. Everything disappears and I melt away along with it.
Robert Altman and DP Vilmos Zsigmond worked closely to give us a very naturalistic film - it’s not just the way shot are blocked or the lighting choices, it has a lot to do with the way the camera moves. In shot after shot the camera movement transports you into the action. Zsigmond moves like you’d move if you were there - immersion - you and the movie are one.
((Well, 51%, I was))
Mrs. Lady Zedd was “watching the same movie” - she says Raymond Chandler’s story twists and turns. Altman removed the lead character, P.I. Marlowe, from his usual post-wamid-century time period and interjects him into a modern (for the production) setting and it’s a risky move that really pays off. The New Hollywood era was tailor made for this sort of rolling around in the gutter, gritty crime-fest. She went on to commend Elliott Gould for his exemplar performance.
So what about that vulgarity laced reaction up top? I don’t know - I think when I’ve simply disappeared into a film, that sudden return to my senses ((shrug)) I’m slapped back into my body, in my chair, in my living room… everything feels familiar but also too big (?), too small, all at the same time. I have to get up, vacate the room, bring myself back into… me.
So - if the film is truly great, if it reached my heart, engaged my mind - you’ll know even before I take up the MAP worksheet. I’ve got my own very Zedd ways of doing things, I know, but I wouldn’t change a thing. One person’s movie on might be wildly different than another’s - what’s most important is we movie on in the first place, just let the chips fall where they may.
Movie On!

I work as a Busser in a fine dining restaurant in Ohio. Last week my manager made a point of telling us that tip outs were based on effort, and that if he felt a team member wasn’t giving it 100% of their effort he would reduce their tip out. He gave us a worksheet explaining it with a “formula” for calculating tip outs. For example if a busser was only giving 65% effort, their tip out would be multiplied by .65 while everybody else’s would stay the same.
This kinda raised everyone’s eyebrows as nobody knew about this arrangement before he told us last week. The tip outs vary widely and often don’t make sense given how busy a shift is, and I’m concerned that I’m not being treated fairly, mainly because this manager has berated me in the past, and yesterday even threw two dish racks at me in a rage as he berated the dishwasher. I’m trying to leave but I want to know if I might have any legal recourse here.

Let's Decode What Depression Is And More

Today I will be going in depth about depression and decoding the word and reasoning with Numerology. We can already see that depression has a lot of repeated letters which shows there is too much of a focus on one thing and too much of something can usually hinder it or cause imbalance.
Let's break down the word DEPRESSION:
The word has E 2 times, S 2 times
D=4
E=5
P=7(16)
R=9(18)
E=5
S=1(19)
S=1(19)
I=9
O=6(15)
N=5(14)
Let's first focus on the obvious! This word has karmic debt numbers for the letters N, P, and S. Let's grab some context from a site that I will link below that explain what these karmic debt numbers mean in detail.
"The 14 Karmic Debt arises from previous actions where human freedom has been abused. Those with a 14 Karmic Debt are forced to adapt to ever-changing circumstances and unexpected occurrences. There is an acute danger of falling victim to drug abuse, alcohol, or overindulgence in sensual pleasures, such as food and sex. Moderation in all affairs is crucial to overcome this Karmic Debt." - credit goes to Karmic Debt Numbers in Numerology World Numerology
"The 16 Karmic Debt – in any area it appears in a chart - means destruction of the old and birth of the new. It is about the fall of the ego and all it has built for itself. It is a watershed, a cleansing. Things the ego has constructed to separate a person from the source of life, are destroyed.
Through the 16, reunion with higher consciousness may be achieved. This can be a painful process because it usually comes after much ego inflation, resulting in a struggle between the ego and higher ideals. Life will present challenges to your grand plans which you may resent and struggle against. It is a losing battle… and you will likely feel humbled in the face of the collapse that follows. However, humility is the key to later success, as you learn to follow the intimations of a deeper reality."
"A person with the 19 Karmic Debt will learn independence and the proper use of power. You will be placed in situations where you are forced to stand up for yourself (and often be left standing alone). One of the central lessons for people with the 19 Karmic Debt revolves around stubbornly resisting help from others. Much of your independence is self-imposed - you simply want to do it your own way.The 19 Karmic Debt can become a self-imposed prison if you don’t recognize the need for interdependence and the mutual need for love.Although you seek to stand on your own feet, you are inextricably connected to others and in need of the support and understanding that all people need - this is the most important lesson for the 19 Karmic Debt." And being personally connected to a lot of 19 energy, this is very true! There is one 19 person I watch on Youtube and he is using this energy pretty well.

DECODING DEPRESSION

Let's take a look at the word. You see it starts with the letter D which is ruled by the number 4 as the 4th letter in the alphabet. 4 energy is connected to privacy, home, family, discontent, restriction, and nonchalant energy. There is many more terms, but you can see where this is going. If you call certain companies toll free, listen to what they say you need to press number 4 for.
What just hit me as I looked at the word is the rest of the word after DE...PRESSION. Maybe there is something needing to be expressed(expression!) that isn't being expressed. All depression is, is suppression of something. D/4 can be suppression and withholding. That's why some jobs want you to fill out the W4 which is a withholding form! Depression comes when someone is choosing to withhold expression of emotions and genuine communication that can help. Taking caution to a whole new level and it ends up being destructive. 4 can point to dissipation which makes sense for destruction to mean what it means.
The word starts with the energy of 4 which is about withholding and suppression and end with the energy of 5 which can be conflicting.
All those letters and we only get to the number 5?!. This word is embedded with the energy of 1 and 9 which means that people who claim or feel depression CAN utilize their personal power to get themselves out of said depression. You have the right to process your emotions and once you do, you can start using your strength and power to overcome. Sometimes it starts with the mind.
Now, based on the letters and numbers with the word, let's see what numbers are missing!
We are missing 2,3,and 8! 2 gives a person a natural comfort within self. It can also make them loveable or easily cooperative with others. The energy of 3 gives a person natural optimism and majestic mental capacity. 8 gives a person a steadfast embedded powerful strength. This 8 energy gives a person unstoppable capability.
Getting over depression is about rising above a situation and having the capability of strengthening your perspective. Your confidence levels are something you have to personally master. Notice how depression ends with O and N which is 6 and 5. That's a backtrack. We're counting forwards, not backwards. 6 is about overcoming problems while 5 is the problems or insecurities. Depression ending with the energy of 5 is a thinkpiece. 5 deals with the uniqueness of a situation or action. You will have to do something different or new to wake up out of whatever this depression was about and understand that everyone's depression won't be the same!
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I see a lot of debate on "giving grace" type policies and there are great arguments for each of them.
Yes, accepting late work is fine because we want students to learn the content, even if it's not on time.
Yes, no 0s is fine because there is a large gap between how many points are an F
Yes, giving extra credit at the end of a semester can make sense if the students are only a few points away.
Year long instead of semester grading is fine because it gives students a chance to get their act together instead of being hopeless for half the year.
The issue comes when all of these and more are in place. Most schools are doing all of these plus some.
If a kid can turn in late work that's absolute shit until the last day of school and just bug the teacher for 3 worksheets when they've done nothing all year then nothing gets done.
My admin is saying that the time after state testing should all be about grade repair.
1) what about the kids who DID their work during the year and want the chance for some fun activities
2) It doesn't seem smart to incentivize kids to do all their learning after the state test that is all admin cares about.

Hello everyone my name is Hannah :) I hope everyone is having a nice Sunday morning. Since my childhood I have suffered from social anxiety, in addition to generally being a quiet and introverted gal. I took the enneagram for the first time this year, and felt pleased with my result because I really resonate with the struggles and strengths of being a 5 lol. I love love love introspection and inner exploration, but I have a lot of trouble with self-expression, being withdrawn, and too detached from the world. I've been struggling with my anxiety recently, wondering - where are you coming from? Asking this question, along with being aware of my weaknesses as a 5, has led me down a path of healing and growing.
Accept yourself, accept your anxiety (you can't run from it).

• I realized that I refused to accept my anxiety because it contradicts the ideal image I have of myself. I am a 23 year old woman. Shouldn't I have tons of friends, go out on weekends, and be perfectly flawless at communication and socializing? Nah, but I feel like I should be that way. I would force myself into situations that made me uncomfortable because I thought that my authentic feelings were invalid - dates, relationships, friendships, commitments. Or I would avoid these situations and beat myself up for "not being like everyone else." Lol.
• Accepting that I have anxiety means that I see myself as a flawed, imperfect human being. This is hurtful because when I was younger, being perfectly in control of my emotions (i.e. suppressing them) meant that I received love and care. When I was frustrated or upset I was often yelled at, shamed, and criticized, as were my siblings. I felt small, trapped, and helpless so I retreated into my head, my safe haven. I became identified with being a cerebrally-centered person. I loved that I had an imaginary world within my head, that I was adept at analysis and searching for meaning, and that I preferred intellectually engaging activities. But I see however an imbalance within myself, a refusal to "play" with the world out of fear of not being ready, fear of being unprepared, fear of being helpless ...
• Anddd this is where self-compassion comes in <3

Practicing self-compassion

• A couple months ago I watched Self-Compassion: An Antidote to Shame, which led me to Dr. Kristin Neff's book Self-Compassion: The Proven Power of Being Kind to Yourself. My biggest take away from my learning is that we are human, and that my experience is a shared, interconnected one, no matter how disconnected and detached I may feel.
• Before introducing self-compassion into my life, I would tend to intellectualize and criticize my emotions if I couldn't make logical sense of them. This led to me separating myself from my emotions, because I had the belief that I'm not allowed to experience negative feelings. They're negative for a reason right?
• But over the past few months, I've learned that SOOTHING my anxiety instead of FIGHTING it is much more helpful! Why? Because when I detach myself from the stories I have about myself and view myself holistically as a human being that REQUIRES care to function healthily, it makes life so much easier for myself.
  • Gather tools and utilize them! This was fun for me as a 5, since we love investigating :) Box breathing, visualizations, and self-love meditations have been my go-tos. Basically you want to get in touch with your parasympathetic nervous system, the part that regulates your emotions and feelings of safety/relaxation. Frequently engaging your PNS makes it easier to tap into it when we feel stressed or unregulated.
  • I am a massage therapist so I love massaging myself and receiving massages! Whatever releases oxytocin and makes you feel good.
  • Use calm, soothing tones with yourself instead of beating yourself up. Validate yourself and what your feeling in the present moment, no matter how illogical or nonsensical your feelings may be. "This is hard right now, isn't it darling?" "I'm going to meet my anxiety with compassion today" and "It's safe for me to feel this emotion."
  • When not feeling anxious, practice engaging your senses more often. Doing this can sooth anxiety and cultivate feelings of safety within our external environments. I noticed that when I am at work or in public I often make myself small, decreasing my view of my surroundings. Creep out of that hole! Look around you. Can you feel the fresh air on your face? Notice the height of the trees? The woman walking her dog? IT'S OKAY TO LOOK <3 Open your self-regulation toolbox if you need to - take deep breaths, imbue yourself with the knowledge that you are SAFE.

Trusting myself

• "I'm just a girl." Have you guys ever seen that trend on TikTok lol? Well, I'm co-opting it. I am just a girl. You're just a boy. A man, a woman, a person, whatever. When I simplify the present moment, it makes it A LOT easier to get out of my head and experience my life as it's playing out. I'll say things like "I'm just a girl who's washing dishes" or "I'm just a girl who's driving her car." Doing that connects me to my humanity and adopts a more objective, higher-self outlook towards myself. When we become entrenched in our stories they become a matrix-like filter over our worlds, complexifying circumstances and the present moment.
• But to engage with life as it's playing out ... you need to trust that you're ready. That you're prepared. That you can handle whatever life throws at you. I've always wondered, why do I feel so helpless? Why does it look like everyone else got a guide to living life and I'm stuck here looking like a fool?
  • Well ... some people got a guide and some people didn't. We all have different experiences in life, of course, and recognizing that is the key to freeing yourself from the dreaded "shoulds." There are some things you're great at and some things you suck at. It is what it is. BUT. The fact that we have assembled a toolkit of grounding tools and techniques means that we can have the confidence to go out and play, explore, and be curious about the world, knowing that we can guide ourselves through moments of discomfort, unease, and fear. This is a practice - it's grueling at first, but as you keep going, it will become unconscious and more natural to you.
• Who are you, really?
  • When I decided to accept my anxiety instead of trying to suppress it, I realized that I am not just my anxiety. I just tend to focus on it more often because it freaks me out more. But I have moments where I am calm, happy, joyful, and confident in myself. I shine in those moments, and I know you do too. You are not relegated to one way of being; you encompass the entirety of the human condition within you.
  • Yesterday, I saw two coworkers chatting closely together. I envied them, wishing that I too could connect like that. But I do have moments of connection with others. I just amplify my worst moments. So instead of berating myself for not being good enough socially I thought ... wow, it's really beautiful that they have that connection with each other. Recognizing that I don't have to always be so focused on the drawbacks of my anxiety really hammered home the point that I can transcend the limitations I have put on myself, and consciously choose to be the person I want to be. Amplify in your mind the experiences you want to see more of.

In learning how to balance our functions, we arrive closer at our core selves, the parts we've been hiding and refusing to see. Being human means giving and taking. I love keeping my thoughts and experiences private, but sometimes the gets universe is hungry too ;) If consume, I must share.

• Dance, journal, verbalize, paint, draw, sing, hum, write, rage room, coloring, worksheets,

If you've experienced severe trauma or you have trouble dealing with anxiety/mental health on your own, please confide in a friend/loved one or seek the help of a professional. This post is just a dump of what I've been collecting for the past few months ;)
I sincerely hope this is helpful, and if you have a perspective or advice to add please share! <3

Hey, so I’m a PFP student this year and finished my N-levels last year. For the Normal Academic students taking N-levels this year (for Normal Academic), and want to get into PFP, here are a few of tips, which you may want to take a read of. (Note that not everything I say in this post is my opinion. There are some parts that may not work for you, but take the parts that do work for you :D ) (Do note, that the subjects I took were: English, Maths, Physics + Chemistry, Social Studies + History, POA (Principals of Accounting) and Chinese, although, I won’t give advice for Chinese, since my Chinese is nowhere near the passing grade) (Disclaimer: If you want to go to ITE however, because you find a course you like there, feel free to take it! You don’t have to go to PFP to ‘achieve’ something, especially if you don’t want to. But if you want to go to ITE just because you don’t think you are “smart enough” to go to PFP, despite wanting to go to PFP, don’t let those thoughts stop you from trying.)
For starters: Set a goal. If you haven’t already, and since now is already May, set a goal for which course you want to get into Poly after N levels. Having a goal is important, as it gives you a sense of clarity of what you’re studying for, and so that you’re not doing it ‘because you have to’. This basically gives you a reason to study, it gives you your drive to study, even when things gets tough. Ideally, try to have this goal placed by May or June, so you’ll still have time to study, if you haven’t already started. After that, even if you don’t have a goal, but still want to get into PFP, just study so that you can have a wider array of courses that you may like to choose from.
How to get started: Well, for starters, getting started studying may seem like a chore to some of you. Although, you should not have to see N-levels as ‘it’s a national exam, therefore, I study’. Instead, you can see this year as a year of growth for you. A year to step outside your comfort zone and do things you normally wouldn’t, since you’re pursuing your dream course! Yeah, that may sound cliche, but trust me, perspective is an important thing. Don’t underestimate it. If you see N-levels negatively, it probably ain’t gonna get any easier. That isn’t to say you shouldn’t see it as nothing either. See it as a journey of self-growth and study, where you know you’ll actually have to put in effort, unlike you did the past 3 years of secondary school (Like me ;-;). If you haven’t started studying, just try picking up your math textbook or any book and look through it. It’s not as bad as you think. Now, onto the subjects!
For English: This is a hard one, as quite some N-level students can’t be certain whether they’ll score well at English, since it’s, well, English (I know that made no sense, but bare with me). - For your oral, I’d recommend sticking to a format, like PEEL or OREO. If you want to be able to project your voice well, or sound clearer, I’d recommend watching news reporters or something like that (for me, it was comic dubs, since I find them a lot more expressive than a news reporter) and try to mimic their voice. Do make sure you choose a person with a voice that sounds clear to mimic, as this is important. Finally, try to use good vocabulary to express your thoughts like ‘ecstatic’, ‘brilliant idea’, ‘strikes a chord with my previous experiences’. This would give you more ways to flaunt your vocabulary and express yourself. Don’t feel pressured if you’re too nervous to use these words in the moment however, and just try to think of words that you can think of, so you don’t stay quiet for too long. For your oral, I recommend writing a few words you’ll probably use for it on a piece of paper. (Write as much as you want, but just be sure you can remember them and actually use them during the oral.) - Next, for your editing, I’d recommend just do editing after editing at your own pace. Don’t worry if you’re faster than your class. Remember, you’re trying to get into PFP, and you have to put in whatever effort you can for that. If you don’t understand something, like the answer to the text, you can consult/text or ask your teacher, whichever you prefer. (You could do that with your friends to, but I personally think asking a teacher is better.) - For email writing, I’d recommend memorising any formats your school has given you. Oh, and use good vocabulary. I can’t think of much else at the moment. - For composition, I’d recommend practicing your writing speed if you’re unable to write it within the time frame. (And if you are able to write within the time frame push yourself to write within half the time frame or 3/4 of it.) Also, good vocabulary, and identify what type of compositions you’re good at writing, and then write them. For me, I think it was the story telling one and the pros and cons one (forgot what they were called). - Tips your vocabulary: Now, I keep mentioning use good vocabulary, but you may wonder “Where in the world do I find that?” Well, you can create a note/document/file on whatever device you have, and place the vocabulary you have inside it. If you read books, comics, watch TV shows or movies, you can pick the words that you don’t understand and find their meanings, and place the words inside the note/document/file. Do place the meanings of the words next to the words themselves, like: Ubiquitous: present, appearing, or found everywhere. If you can’t get any words, you can ask me here on Reddit, (although I’m not very tech-savvy, so I probably won’t reply instantly) and I’ll send a few words.
For math: - I think the key idea is studying your yearly and topical TYS. I started studying last year by doing the textbook to revise for math, but soon found out there were too many questions for each topic, but the TYS is just like a summary of each topic which makes it a lot easier. - While doing math questions, if you come across any question you don’t know, you can take a screenshot of it on any device, edit the photo to add your question, or note down the question you about that specific math question. If you have your math teacher’s phone number, you can send it to them, asking them to explain it. If not, you could always request for consultations with them. They won’t eat you. (I think/hope) - Also, I recommend writing on a piece of paper using a pen or a pencil at your own time, all the necessary formulas that you need to memorise (quadratic equation, formulas for area and volume of each shape and the rest). You can highlight them to memorise them better. The reason for this, is because I’m pretty sure writing on paper using a pen/pencil helps your brain retain (remember) information better.
For Physics and Chemistry: - There’s no easy way around it, you have to understand the concepts, then memorise. What I suggest that can help is creating an online note/document/file with each chapter for each of the sciences inside it to store all the information inside on your phone for quick and easy access, so you can easily take out your phone and memorise on the train, at home, or if you’re bored with nothing to do at recess/lunch, don’t let your time go to waste. Remember to highlight or underline the keywords in each sentence, and I highly suggest using an online place to make notes for your science, since I feel that there’s a lot of sentences in science, and unless you’re a fast writer, I personally think you’re probably going to waste a lot of time writing that all the chapters in physics and chemistry down. But if it helps you memorise by writing, I can’t complain.
For Social Studies and History: - Honestly, I feel like you have to understand the writing formats well (by asking your teacher for consultations about anything you’re unsure of regarding the formats), and the content well to do well for these. Oh, and while practicing papers, I recommend trying to finish the papers in a shorter time than the actual time. If you can do that, you won’t have to worry too much about messing up halfway and not having enough time to complete the paper. I don’t remember much else.
For POA: - I think it’s similar to how I’d study for math in a sense. Keep practicing the topics your weak at, but don’t neglect the topics you’re good at. I also recommend writing each of the accounting theories on a piece of paper for easy reference, as well as a summary for the important things you have to remember for each topic.
Regarding studying for all the subjects: - I think it’s extremely important that you consult/text/ask your subject teachers any questions you may have related to any subject. Afterwards, try to jot down the question you had and record what the teacher said, so that way, you’ll understand what you were unsure of and can use it for future reference. If you’re not able to consult your teachers, consult your friends who are good at the subject :D - When you practice papers for any subject, try not to refer to any notes or worksheets, since it will help give you an actual feeling of how you’ll do in a test. It may be harsh at first, but once you get used to it, you won’t have to worry so much about relying on your notes. - Try to finish your practice papers for any subject, before the actual time limit. (For example, if your paper is 2 hours, try to finish it within 1 hour 30 minutes. After some practice, you should be able to nail it. Just make sure to check your work and ensure your handwriting isn’t too much of a mess.) - In class, if the teacher says anything that is important, jot it down in whatever worksheet you may have. Sometimes, useful information isn’t given on your worksheets/notes, but comes from lessons, so do try to jot down notes in class. It can also help you understand more about the things you’re unsure of. - Set a schedule daily so you can focus on what needs to be done. (e.g: Monday - Finish an SS paper before dinner. Tuesday - Cover one math topic…etc.)
Regarding motivation and dedication to studying: - If you have your dream course in mind, keep studying til you reach it! But don’t forget to stay healthy. Remember to drink water and exercise. I recommend keeping a personal journal and to jot down your feelings inside it. For me, it really helped, as I was able to see how I felt (e.g: being not as good as math as some of my friends earlier in the year). - Remember a few motivating quotes to help you when you encounter difficulties, like: “You don’t drown by falling in the water, you drown by staying there.”, “Our paths may shape us, but it does not set our destinies in stone.“ , “Don’t give up just because you feel defeated, the other side is achievable only after great suffering.”(And any other ones you find helpful and inspiring.) - I also recommend listening to motivating songs just before you study. A few of my personal favourites for positive motivation are: “Legends Never Die”, “Battle Scars” by Paradise Fears and “King” by Lauren Aquilina. - However, there are some days when you’re just slacking off and doing nothing. For that, I recommend telling yourself to get back up, reminding yourself you don’t have all the time in the world to study, but you need to remember to take breaks. A few songs I have for reminding yourself to do better: “The Phoenix” by Fall Out Boy and “Epoch (The Living Tombstone’s Remix”.
Now, that was long. Took me two weeks to write this, but hey, that’s cool. I managed to finish it anyway :D I hope you found my tips useful, and til your N-levels, don’t stop, march on!

Basically what the title asks. My situation is that I am currently deferred for non mental stuff and gave all the information over that the AME suggested per their worksheet. However, I got a dreaded request for additional information, and have no clue as to what it could be about.
Are there any ways to get info on what they want before I receive the physical letter? I have mixed responses from people on that there is no way around it, or reaching out to the regional flight surgeon or something like this. And mixed guidance whether these letters go out fast, vs it using the same clogged up internal mailing systems the IRS uses coupled with USPS sucking.
In the case I am in a long wait; is there anything dual that I can knock out? Looking at most of the major requirements for IR+ it seems it's all solo logs. After I gave the instructor news of the deferral he told me to lay off the training until it comes in, implying that there is no point in more dual training than needed. Any tips or flying I can do that make sense? Or am I just better / objectively stuck in holding?
Edit: Following my own advice to keep the ball rolling, I am trying to keep healthy, but have been discouraged from writing any other exams than the PAPPL which I already have done.

So this happened last week and I am currently in a lot of hot water over this. So for context, my English literature classes are currently covering the book "Life of Pi" and because the book's quite big, instead she told us to watch the movie instead, I on the other hand had already finished the book cause I love reading books anyways you would expect that the teacher would have at least read the book once but you'd be wrong she instead watched the movie. In my class, we have seven students and all of them except me probably never even touched the book.
Anyways, we were having online classes that day cause its really hot where I live, so in the class she was discussing multiple choice questions and one of them asks "What does Pi construct on the lifeboat to create a sense of security for himself and Richard Parker?" with the options being a shelter, a barrier, a hammock or a raft. My teacher told us that the correct answer is a barricade, I told her isn't it supposed to be a raft, she says no Pi creates a barricade to protect himself from the tiger, I then say if she is talking about the book or movie, she replies that she is talking about the book, I then say that Pi in the book constructs a raft to protect himself from the tiger, she replies that the mini raft acts as a barricade so it is a barricade, I reply that the answer to this question is a raft, she then gets pissed and basically says bro, just write any of the two and I will accept them, if you want to write raft, write raft (I am having to translate this this to English cause she told it me in my country's native language) after that she started discussing a question which asks what profession did Pi's dad have, after she saying the answer she sarcastically asked me if I wanted to debate about this as well, I told her no because the question is very simple, she then again tells me while laughing why I ask so many questions then and if her worksheet is wrong, I replied saying yes but not the entire thing, she then announces to the entire class that she is going to end the class and that (my name) can take the class from now on, after that she left the class, making her end the class 17 mins before she was supposed to end it ( each of my classes are 40 mins long).
My parents hearing about this situation gave me a lecture, telling me I should apologize to her cause she is my teacher and that I am way too oversmart, also I have a very big ego and have no manners.
Am I the AITA in this situation?

I am feeling very… incompetent and overwhelmed. I would love for some fellow ECE professionals to tell me if I have a right to feel this way and what I should do about it. I would also love some advice from parents, as I feel like the parents of my kids are becoming increasingly frustrated with me about their child’s lack of visible educational growth.
For context, I was hired to be the lead pre-K teacher for a group of 10+ mixed-age kids (not saying the exact amount) with the average age being four years old. I was hired under the understanding that I would have an assistant and a certain amount of time per week of planning.
At first, I had an assistant. She was there for about 3 weeks before I could tell she did not like the pressure of the classroom. When the admin offered her a different position outside of the classroom, she took it. I’m not faulting her for that, but where my issue lies is that they told me about this change one day and it went into effect immediately the next day, meaning I was quite literally alone within 24 hours. That was a few months ago. They have not hired a replacement.
Here’s where I find myself drowning. Although I am within ratio, my workload has increased exponentially due to the fact that it’s just me. As it stands, I am the opener, the middle, and the closer for my room. I have been coming in to work five to ten minutes early every day so I can clean and prep a bit before I get my kids from the class next door. I take down the chairs, set the calendar, lay out breakfast, make sure the bathrooms are clean, and then I get my kids. During nap, I clean the sinks, toilets, mirrors, tables, floors, windows, door handles, a bucket of toys, and the chairs. After the kids leave, I clean the bathrooms again, sinks, vacuum, sweep, mop, restock supplies and cleaners, and laundry. Since I am the lead, I am also responsible for curriculum. I’m supposed to plan a month in advance, get supplies, prep materials, execute lessons daily, and document the children (parents are supposed to receive MINIMUM of four photos per week). On top of this, since I am alone, I am the only one who is able to monitor and correct behavior. Three of my kids can be just plain mean. I have four with speech needs. Four of them are quite physical. There’s three pairs of kids who do not get along AT ALL, and there’s one who only speaks by yelling. My eyes have to be scanning the room always. To be quite frank, between cleaning and putting out fires, curriculum has been on a back burner. I usually let them free play and do my best just to keep them alive. I have not been getting my planning time per week, so doing it during the day hasn’t been possible. I end up leaving anywhere from 10-50 minutes late every day, and I get in trouble for overtime. I would say I could skimp on some cleaning or closing duties, but since im the closer and the opener in my room, cutting corners means that I screw myself. During the day, no one checks on me. If we haven’t had callouts, a floater will let me go to the bathroom once in the morning, but other than that, I’m on my own for the whole day.
Parents have been pointedly asking me what their child is learning. One mother said, “I see she comes home with art, but what are the things she is LEARNING?” (Her child spends the majority of free play in the art center). I wasn’t mad at the question. It’s a totally fair thing to ask. But it sure was awkward for me to stand there and try to explain how her child did not in fact learn anything that day (academically speaking, at least. She did learn how to share and socialize, so I count that as learning). I just don’t have physical evidence of academics because there isn’t even time for me to run to the printer to copy a worksheet. I sense the tension with a couple other parents who are academically focused. I know they know that I’m not getting the lesson plans done. It’s embarrassing and even though I really am trying my hardest, I’m so ashamed.
My boss has not been helpful. I’ve told her multiple times that I’m struggling and she says “I understand.” I’ve told her I am doing the job of two people and she said, “we’re hiring for that spot.” I was told a few months ago that they were bringing in two people to interview. I’ve emailed HR and got sent to a higher up, who said she also “understands.” I have asked for help and made my needs known, but nothing changes.
I find myself snappy with the kids and getting burned out. It feels like my treadmill pace is set to 15 but I can only run 9. I can’t keep up. I’m overwhelmed and discouraged. I feel like I’m disappointing parents and not living up to expectations. I feel like a glorified babysitter. I feel very alone and voiceless. I feel like I am doing the job of 2 people, yet I get in trouble for not doing it in 8 hours. Ultimately, it feels like I simply just can’t do it all.
ECE professionals: Do I have a right to feel this way? Is this a typical workload, or is this actually unreasonable? Parents: How would you react if you knew your child’s teacher was in this situation? Would you be upset at the teacher for not completing lesson plans as expected?
TL/DR: I’m flying solo and struggling. Is this normal?

TL;DR class descriptions/info to help underclassmen know about classes thru personal experiences. Add to it with extra info or questions!
To all the incoming freshmen or other underclassmen - you’ll prolly hear it a lot, but the time really does go by so fast. Enjoy it, soak it in, and step out of your comfort zone. Someone posted their classes thru Purdue to let other students know how those classes were (in case it was a niche/high-level class or it wasn’t on RateMyProfessor). That was pretty helpful to me so Imma do it too. I’ll let u kno how the courses went and what I can remember. I’m graduating from the College of Ag with a B.S. in Animal Sciences with a concentration in Biosciences and minors in Biotechnology and Real Estate. I came into Purdue with AP and Dual Credits, so some things I didn’t take. Anyway, here are the classes I took.
Anyone who’s taken any of these, please add on/say smth else if it has changed! Underclassmen, feel free to ask about them!
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FRESHMAN YEAR
AGR 101: Intro to Ag & Purdue (Multiple lecturers)
This course was THE intro course to Purdue and Ag (duh). It was a 1/2 semester course so I was done with it by week 8 and there was only a quiz. We were told the purpose of Purdue being land-grant and were just intro’d to the different parts/departments of the college of Ag + different success tips. This was also the class where u begin (already) thinking about your 4-year plan and create a LinkedIn. Easy A, just show up and learn about the college of Ag
AGR 114: Intro to ANSC Programs (Ashley York)
Also a 1/2 semester course that was done by Oct. This class just went into depth on what to expect as a student in the department. You may start work on a resumé, continue with planning or LinkedIn. Again, easy A, just show up. Also, Ashley was a saint helping me each year to make sure I was on track, even tho she wasn’t my advisor.
ANSC 102: Intro to Animal Ag (Elizabeth Karcher)
This class was the first “real” class of college. It was just an intro to different domestic species and the operations tht are part of animal ag. I think there was also a lab with the class where u were introduced to animals. Dr. Karcher also was a pretty good professor. Just pay attention - it’s sort of memorization for random facts about animals/common sense depending on what u took in high school/home life in a rural area. Should be easy A.
CHM 115: Gen Chem (Multiple lecturers)
Was never a fan of chemistry, so this class I went into with dread. I didn’t want to take AP Chem, and just dealt with it in college. Honestly, if u took honors/were a good student in hs chemistry, there should be no problem - was basically just like a high school class. There was a lab that went with this course, but because of COVID, I just had an online worksheet to do every week for pre-, in-, and post-lab so I can’t speak on it. If u aren’t inclined to chem, it might take a bit of extra studying, but I was never worried.
PHIL 110: Intro to Philosophy (Taylor Davis)
To be fair, I never exactly wanted to take this exact class. I came from a small town in the Midwest, so I wanted to be sure I wasn’t dumb or anything to the people, cultures, etc. around me. Told my advisor I wanted to take a class to give me more of a “world” perspective, so she suggested the class. It honestly was not bad at all. The professor knew what he was talking abt and very accepting of questions. We learned how to tear down an argument and build it up in several ways and talked about cool things like if we have free will, does God exist, etc. The only assignments that counted for the sem were a midterm and 2 papers - 1 small and 1 large philosophical essay over any topic from the class. Definitely changed my outlook, would recommend taking it. The first part of class was harder - making sure u understand why/how an argument does or doesn’t work - but the rest was fun/easy as the topics were just presented and talked about.
AGEC 217: Economics (Larry Deboer)
I found Econ as a topic in and of itself to be quite boring. Supply and demand, money, etc. The class kind of turned out that way. Its presented as basically supply/demand and reasons for changes to the them were slowly added throughout the semester. We had several assignments, but they were nothing terrible. Gotta give props to the professor, tho. He knew the class wasn’t great but made it fun. Also, the class is flexible for schedules as in some situations it can count for credit in place of ECON251.
POL 223: Intro to Environmental Policy (Tara Grillos)
When I first started, I thought the route I wanted was ANSC with some focus in environmental issues. That’s why I took this class. I don’t understand the “intro” part, really. The whole class was presented as just case studies for things that have happened that impacted policies from the late 1800s/early 1900s until recently. Some of the info was cool. I don’t remember much for assignments, but there was a group project/paper where u had to decide on an environmental issue, state how u plan to fix it, on what level of government, etc. It wasn’t a crazy class to be in as a freshman, but it was not what I was expecting for a POL class.
ANSC 181: Orientation to ANSC (Elizabeth Byers)
Another 1/2 semester course. This class, as far as I can remember, was just for showing u the possibilities available to u in ANSC. This was specifically ANSC. It went over every concentration and what jobs/salaries there were. This was also a class where we were assigned to create our resumés (professionally) and start networking. Just as, if not easier than the other 1/2 semester classes so far.
ANSC 221: Principles of Animal Nutrition (Dale Forsyth)
Sorry but not sorry for anyone in ANSC. The class is boring, but Dr. Dale Forsyth is such a sweet old man. This class is the intro for nutrition in ANSC. U will learn the different required nutrients, food stuffs (supplements and stuff too) that have these nutrients, what happens when animals are given too little of these, and how to balance/create rations for animals (ruminant and non-ruminant). As long as u are okay/good with algebra, there shouldn’t be a problem. U just need to solve systems of equations in Excel to get the right weight of a food stuff. Homework was balancing rations. Exams looked at that + nutrients and their deficiencies. Dr. Forsyth also talks fast and doesn’t slow down because he has a lot to get thru. Come into the class knowing it prolly isn’t going to be very fun, but u need to know it. Try to find something interesting in the whole.
BIOL 111: Fundamentals of Bio II (Sean Humphrey)
Not sure how this class really is. I came into college loving biology and being (not to sound like an ass) great at it. To me, it was easy and relearning biology from high school for a bit. To others it may be a bit more difficult. There is just a lot of memorization. The professor was nice and answered my questions when I had them and explained in great detail if I was confused. I can’t remember any assignments I turned in, or anything about exams. Overall, I thought it was an easy class, but be the judge urself.
CHM 116: Gen Chem (Multiple lecturers)
Just a continuation of CHM 115. It picked up where it left off. Got a little harder, but it was nowhere as hard as TV or anything makes it. There are definitely topics that show up from hs again, but a lot is new. Wasn’t fun for this class switching lecturers every few weeks since they each had their own lecture style. Again, there was a lab section, but because of COVID, it was a worksheet. Not the worst class, but a meh class.
MA 16020: Applied Calc II (Alexandros Kafkas)
The first and only time I had to take math here. In hs I took MA 165 and thought it was a breeze (prolly bc it was hs). To anyone wondering, MA 165 SHOULD count in place of MA 16010 in college of ag. With that in mind, I went into the course knowing what Purdue math is known for, but still keepin an open mind with my abilities. I’m really proud of the grade I got, too. I think a lot of the course depends on the lecturer - mine was good at teaching us new concepts. Learn all you can about the lecturer beforehand, find out if they are good, and see it for yourself. We had quizzes in class every week (MWF) over the previous lecture and homework thru LON-CAPA that was usually due the day aftebefore (Tues, Thurs, Sun, I think). The quizzes and homework were good starting problems. The exams were tough and harder than quizzes/hw. If u’ve done well in math, but aren’t a prodigy or someone who can put in hrs of work, don’t expect to get likely higher than mid-70s on exams. It was common to get around a 50-60%. They do curve “if it’s necessary” but it is ALWAYS necessary.
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SOPHOMORE YEAR
AGR 201: Communicating Across Cultures (Pamala Morris)
To start…BOO. Was not a fan of this class. Felt like it was a money grab and busy work. It was required for some international understanding credits. The content wasnt interesting but for sure important. We were taught to basically be good ppl and about the different types of hardships that groups of ppl could go thru (ageism, sexism, racism, classism, etc.). We were required to buy the book, which was $50, but written by the prof and from what I assume was her website. I don’t recall ever using it unless it was necessary for an assignment. The class helps u relate and think critically, but is done in a piss-poor way. It could hv been the COVID aftermath where lecture was done virtually but we had a class later on with other students for a “lab”. Quizzes were easy, and overall easy, but so bad too.
SPAN 201: Spanish III (Nancy Reyes)
I know I’ve said this already abt other courses, but this still applies. This course was 100% a high school class. I did a placement test into this course (after 3 years in HS Spanish - Fr. to Jr. - with a 2 year gap of not learning) and got all credit for Spanish 1 and 2. Took it for international understanding credits. This course made sure u knew the basics again, spent a lot of time in past tense, then ended w maybe a month in subjective and future tense. There were a few speaking assignments and cultural readings/lectures. Was encouraged to speak Spanish for class, but the prof knew that couldn’t happen but still helped us all. Exams included MC, writing, and listening. Not sure if this is the same for other languages, but hopefully it is.
CHM 255 + 25501: Orgo + Lab (Elizabeth Parkinson)
Dreaded this class, but went in confidently. The class sucks, no other way abt it. It was a lot of memorization and practice. A lot of the “basic” stuff started sticking about halfway thru the semester. It doesn’t help that I stopped going to lecture about 3/4 thru the sem. It wasn’t as hard as expected, but it was still quite hard. The prof was amazing at making the content interesting. Labs were ran by GTAs. Depending on the section your GTA may not kno anything. The labs also did not go along with the lecture - they are 2 separate courses that can individually be passed or failed. Exams were as you would expect with the course - a few high spots among a crowd of C’s and D’s. The lab had multiple things due every week w the semester started. It was expected to do ur pre-lab at start of week, turn in ur in-lab immediately after finishing lab, then the previous week’s post-lab/final lab was due. The lab also holds the policy that if u don’t show up dressed right or sleep late, if you don’t show up within 10/15min of start that u can’t show up and will receive a 0 for the lab.
ANSC 230: Physiology of Domestic Animals (Rod Allrich)
This class taught me a lot. Each week was a different body system and learning info regarding animals individually. Things were taught in general as overarching concepts, but then things were applied as necessary for individual species of animals. Everything was brought up from the digestive system to the endocrine system. The class met 4 days a week and had a quiz once a week. There was no lab when I took the course. The specific professor I had was also interesting to say the least. Dr. Allrich is a funny, good man, but he does not use or create slides. Instead he uses his own website to post info (usually from Merck veterinary) abt whatever it is he wanted u to learn. In class he would just ramble on about what he thought was important. ANYTHING he said could be test material - no matter what (I was told by an upperclassman to remember that his favorite pie was sour cream and raisin pie bc it was a quiz question they had). Now, there is a lab that goes with the course. Also, if u hv Cabot the course material and class are much harder than with Rod. There are expectations, lectures, and more. Regardless of the professor, the information that was taught was useful, remembered, and interesting. In any class, Rod typically will have this structure but will grade easily. Quizzes will be to write statements of fact and exams won’t exist or will be take-home with only having 5 paragraphs to write using a word bank
ABE 226: Biotech Lab I (Kari Clase)
This was the first course I took for my minor in Biotechnology. I did not know what to expect going in as I didn’t grasp the scope of biotech. The course was ran well. The whole class is a wet lab where u are in the scientific process trying to find a new species of bacteriophage. U dig in dirt, do some pipetting, use beakers, make plates, isolate DNA, and send it off. Any research u do/finding a phage gets put into a national database for phage research. U do hv lab notebooks that get checked, but hv an outline to go off. There were several quizzes and deliverables that had us learn about phage more, or aseptic technique. It was a good class. U do have to buy a lab coat (which is kinda cool). Easy class that kickstarted my interest.
CHM 256 + 25601: Orgo II + Lab (David Thompson)
This class was disastrous. It was me, the content AND the professor as to why that was the case. This was just a continuation of course and lab. The new content was harder to wrap my head around, + I stopped going to the lectures about halfway thru the sem. To make matters worse, the class was early and the prof was speaking in mach turtle. I would listen to the lectures a day later so I could 2x speed thru them and the man was sounding like a normal person talked. This class was harder than the previous course. If u didn’t like CHM 255, sorry this is worse. The lab was just the same as the previous sem, but the GTAs changed. Again, labs didn’t go with the lecture and are 2 individual courses to be passed or failed separately. I passed but the class made me rethink my life once or twice and was potentially the worst class I ever took.
STAT 301: Elementary Stat Methods (Spencer Hamrick)
I did not enjoy this course a single bit - besides the professor. The course throws, what I felt like, was the entire concept, terms, rules, designs of statistics at u. It was a lot at once for me. I felt like there was a disconnect between what I was learning and in what ways it applied to me. It wasn’t too difficult, but the class was boring. There was also a lab section that was not great either. We were forced to use SRSS. There were homework assignments on a different software/website that equally were boring. The exams were harder than expected - there were some sections with questions with such small disparities that the answer came down to a difference of 1 word in a sentence. Overall, there’s a lot to learn and it’s all pretty basic to give a general understanding, but it was done poorly. If it was done better, it likely would have been an easy course. This course tho is also one of the worst classes I took.
AGRY 320: Genetics (Joseph Anderson)
There’s not much to say about this course. It was genetics. It felt like another continuation from the end of BIOL 111. It built a foundation for DNA, chromosomes, and went from there. There was a lot of higher thinking and content that was build upon thru the semester. It was a bit of memorization, but the content was fun. There were hotseat/iclicker questions for each lecture. Prof. Anderson was also really good at presenting the info.
AGRY 321: Genetics Lab (Aneesha Kulkarni)
This was the lab that went with AGRY 320. It was separate from the lecture. I do not believe it ever followed along with the lecture. The semester was spent with Arabidopsis. From the plant, we extracted DNA, did PCR, did mutant analysis, etc. The whole semester led up to a final lab report for what had been done that semester. There were also some small lab assignments that needed done. The class was also serious about attendance which could have made a major impact on grades. It is also typically ran by a GTA. It was fun and I enjoyed it. There was never really any work that needed to be done outside of class and at times it let out early.
ANSC 333: Physiology of Reproduction (Jonathan Pasternak)
This was a good class. The content focused on female anatomy/physiology first, then male anatomy/physiology, then on interactions and changes to the body through hormones and development. I found the class to be interesting as there is a lot more that goes into reproduction that u think. It’s a lot of cool info thrown out, but in a manageable way. Notes can go fast n there is a lot of terms and items to pay attention to. There was also a lab portion to this class. The lab went with what we learned in lectures. It was hands-on learning and doing things. It might sound gross but we had a lab where we took fetuses from a pig uterus to weigh and look at. We also looked at pig semen under a microscope. The professor was obsessed with histology. Expect to look at many slides of different tissues and know how/why they differ, where they are from, etc. I don’t remember assignments, but there was a lab practical that involved many things. Overall, it was a fun class.
ABE 227: Biotech Lab II (Kari Clase)
This class was busy. There were lots of things that needed to be done often (oddly no true deadlines it felt like). This was the dry lab portion. After ABE 226, any DNA that was collected sufficiently was sequenced and the data came back. That’s essentially what the semester was for. With the DNA from a phage, u must make entries to find out the start/stop site of genes, gene function; BLAST the genes, gather evidence there is truly a gene, and more. There were some small assignments with deliverables. There was also a larger project that was put into the undergrad research symposium. From the DNA, a small group chose a gene and researched. A lot of busy work and nights up, but there was a final genome announcement and research went into real life.
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JUNIOR YEAR
HIST 33805: History of Human Rights (Rebekah Klein-Pejsova)
This class was a requirement for an upper level humanities course. This class was easy and interactive. There were some readings that had to be done outside of class, but not much else was required. U would read, then come to class, fill out a discussion, and talk. The content started back in history and moved all the way to just beyond the Holocaust. There were a couple writing assignments that were like a paragraph. The final was to write a paragraph on when u thought the history of human rights began. Again, easy and almost no work required.
BCHM 307: Biochem (Barbara Golden)
I loved this course. Dr. Golden was soft spoken but she made sure u got the info u needed. The content felt like a mix of genetics and chem. The course was biology-sided for those that hate chem. This course went back to the central dogma and such, but then included a lot of metabolism and inner workings of cells. There were parts involving the Citric acid cycle and other “basic” biology concepts that went into further explanation from a different perspective. I believe there were also hotseat/iclicker questions. If u liked biology or genetics, u should like this course, too.
BCHM 309: Biochem Lab (Orla Hart)
Just like the genetics lab, this lab did content that led up to something big at the end. The lab was spent learning basic lab technique, then focused on isolating and purifying LDH from a Bradford assay. There were lab reports/assignments, but they all help and lead to the big lab report. It was a fun time. Dr. Hart was a fantastic prof for the course as she fully knew the topic, always helped out, and had high expectations. She would also joke and talk with us. She shared about her family (she’s Irish), her cats, n more. + she would talk with you in her office, where she had Ghirardelli chocolates to eat. There was a written midterm + u are required to wear a lab coat and goggles during lab.
ANSC 311: Animal Breeding & Genetics (Donna Lofgren)
This was another class that I liked a lot. For anyone interested in this topic, it is not what u expect. The class is not punnet squares and seeing what traits u can see. This class was a lot of math. You had to find the allelic/gene frequencies, var, covariance, selection intensity, generation interval, EBV, etc. I cannot stress that this class is a lot of math (prolly 75/25 to 85/15 for math/concepts). It is, however, one of the few genetics restrictive selectives for ANSC (if I remember right). There is other content too, learning about how to breed animals, components of breeding and genetics, etc. There is a lecture and lab. The lab is when homework was intro’d and we were given time to ask questions/complete it. The lab lasted 2 hours, and usually there would be several homework problems left. There was also a large project that used a sim (mine was beef, other years used lamb/sheep). I would have to cull and breed to get better genetics, get rid of disease, etc. The better the offspring the better. This sim was paired with an arrow chart and written report. Lot of work, but a lot of fun.
ANSC 326: Applied Non-Ruminant Nutrition (John Radcliffe)
This class was boring. Unless u love animal nutrition, it’s hard for it not to be. This was like a continuation of ANSC 221, but only focused on (essentially) pigs. Once again, just learning the background/basic info for feeding animals, providing nutrients, and balancing/creating rations. Also, this class also uses a lot of Excel - more than ANSC 221. There was a final for the course, but it was only a 1/2 semester course. There may have also been a lab section, but the work typically finished quickly.
ANSC 446: Companion Animal Mgmt (Rod Allrich)
Another course with Rod. It was basically nonsense. U learned what it took to keep companion animals healthy and managed. Specific diseases/interests were looked at for animals during class + issues/problems with animal clinics, shelters, etc. There wasnt much to learn. Since it was Rod, there were no slides. Anything written could be tested. Students had to present some issue with companion animals for points twice in the semester. There was also an animal business plan due at the end of the semester. It was required to describe the location, services, employees, their benefits, etc. There were no exams, but there were his quizzes - u were provided movies to watch and write a 1-page summary/reflection on what u saw. Once u get used to Rod, his classes are some of the easiest to ever take.
MGMT 200: Intro Accounting (Terra Maienbrook)
This was my first class for my Real Estate minor. If u have taken any math class at college u should be fine. This course is an intro. U learn the accounting equation, debits, credits, depreciation, and interpreting it through balance sheets. It can get a little confusing when things are broken down further, but as long as u pay attention there shouldn’t be trouble. Just remember what debits and credits do and u should pass the course. There were assignments that helped understand what needed to be done and how the content u are learning works, but it turns into busy work later on. If u get 1 small error as ur doing ur balance sheet, then the whole problem will be wrong and it probably won’t tell u what the error is. The professor also used hotseat/iclicker for attendance, so make sure to show up. She did let u come to any section at any time and still do the attendance. Exams weren’t difficult if u pay attention and do well in lecture and homework. If u do well, the prof would even email saying that u did well.
MGMT 304: Intro to Financial Mgmt (Phil Baeza)
This class was okay. Part of it could have been it was the prof’s 2nd semester teaching here. The class was a lot of basic info for management/econ and was also a requirement for the Real Estate minor. U are taught corporate finance + the goals of it, cash flows and a bunch of math with related terms (NPV, PV, NWC, NOI, etc.) None of it was exactly difficult to figure out. The class itself wasn’t bad content-wise. Once u learned the information, it was there. There was a lot of Excel for solving problems. If u aren’t good with Excel - make that a priority. The course also had exams, but you were allowed a typed cheat sheet for each. Besides the exams, there was also a case competition (so many of these in MGMT classes). Info was gathered about a company and with a group had to decide to approve or disapprove of their loan request. Overall, not terrible, but hard to sit thru.
ANSC 303: Animal Behavior (Marisa Erasmus)
This was an interesting class to take. It was pretty fun (and I ended up as a TA, my last semester). The course is essentially psychology in animals. You learn conditioning, scientists who contributed to the study, types of interactions, and types of behaviors (maintenance, maternal, social, play, sickness, etc.) and how they are in animals. The course also has a lab section with it. The lab section is essentially to allow for time for the zoo project, although there were some labs that went to the ASREC to observe those animals. For the project u are provided an animal at the zoo to research, go to the local zoo, and observe them. When ur back you create a presentation for the research you did involving the animal and enrichment provided by the zoo. In class, there were several quizzes over lecture content plus a midterm. There were also assignments, but many of them had some involvement with the zoo. The class also had no final, but there was a final quiz. The professor did talk fast sometimes, but as long as you typed or rewrote notes later, there was no issue.
STAT 503: Stat Methods for Biology (Yan Xing)
Unsure of why, but I loved my grad level stats courses. They were much easier and fun to learn than STAT 301 (so if u hate STAT301, give 503 a try). This course basically started at the beginning. The content started with learning sample vs population, statistic vs parameter, plus sample unit, size, variables, and variable types. The course became harder as time went on, but nothing was super difficult. The topics included basic stats (mean, stdev, var, types of distributions, unions/intersection), marginal probability, tree diagrams, binomial distributions, chi-square, ANOVA, hypothesis testing, and multiple comparisons (like bonferonni). The information was always presented in a way catered to life sciences (crazy). The lectures not presented in class, but expected to be watched beforehand. I did not go to lecture, but watched the lecture videos on my own. That was enough understanding to easily pass. There were homework assignments that were due every other week. Start them sooner than later, you’ll need the time! This class was also my introduction to coding in R. I had no experience in any coding beforehand but easily got the hang of it, especially since the professor provided tutorials. It was used for every homework, basically. There were also quizzes that weren’t too difficult. The class was not easy, but it was fun.
ABE 512: Good Regulatory Practices (Keri Clase/Stephen Byrn)
This was the final class I needed to get my Biotechnology minor. It was terrible. The professors were nice, but there was no structure. The lectures were about regulatory science and dealt a lot with information from the FDA. The course went over the good and required practices required for the creation, testing, passing, and distribution of medical equipment and/or drugs. Every small detail and information that was not in lectures was required to be known. There were quizzes and assignments that all got turned in through Gradescope. The quizzes are where random information was expected to be known. The assignments were deliverables which asked some question or inquired about a part of the process and write about them. The final was a final deliverable that had to effectively be a conglomeration of the other deliverables (but not just copying and pasting). The class wasn’t hard, but very poorly set up.
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SENIOR YEAR
CSR 103: Intro to Personal Finance (Wookjae Heo)
I just needed a filler class in my schedule. I figured it could help learn some “real world” stuff that maybe I wasn’t sure about. The class was completely online with provided lecture videos. It was very easy and what would be expected. Topics went from how to manage debt and make sure you can get loans, to being informed about credit cards and insurance. All the information was easy to get through. There were writing assignments to be done basically every week. The professor would have you read a paper that 50/50 he had a part in writing, and answer questions. Some things were interactives that just needed to be completed (regardless of how well). Not a bad class. It will definitely pad your GPA - everything taught should be common knowledge.
MGMT 370: Real Estate Fundamentals (Lindsay Relihan)
This course was quite informative. It was an average level of difficulty. There was a lot of information that went into it - I mean it is a fundamentals class. Topics that were talked about included foundations of real estate, what is real estate, valuation of property, lending, time value of money, multiple financial ratios, and taxation. There were multiple assignments - some writing and others math. The writing was for discussions (5 of them) about certain papers provided or certain book chapters. The math assignments were problem sets to get done for what we had learned. They gave plenty of time to finish them. Beyond that, there was also another case study/competition. For this a company was selected and given potential locations to move to. You had to decide if it was worth it for the company to move locations.
ANSC 345: Animal Health Management (Rod Allrich)
For this class, I just needed to take another ANSC course. This class was practically the same as any other Rod Allrich course. We learned how to keep animals healthy and basically many different common diseases of animals. From his website, we would get brought to a page talking about some disease or medical problem that could potentially happen and have to write a 1-page summary/reflection. This happened each week. He still did in person quizzes with statements of fact. Once again, students had to make videos/presentations for the class to present on some problem. There was no final exam. Did not learn too much from this one, but it was a great space filler and GPA booster.
ANSC 481: Contemporary Issues in ANSC (Barry Delks)
This is essentially the final push for ANSC students. As seniors, you take this course to prepare you for the real world. Lectures were given by guests who the professor brought in. They would talk about their specific company, career, or niche and any issues they were seeing there plus how to stop them. The professor would then have groups get together to discuss ways to fix the problems and have the guest comment on what was said. There were also assignments to be done, but they were very easy. They were just things to make sure you were on track for a job and/or graduation (having a 30-sec intro, making a cover letter, redoing your resumé). Part of the class was also just attending the career fair.
STAT 512: Applied Regression Analysis (Tiantian Qin)
Like my other grad level stat course, I absolutely loved this one, too. This class was a DIST course. This class solely focused on regressions (simple linear and multiple linear regressions). Topics for the course started with the basics (terms of regression like betas, Xs, SSE, SSR, SST, and diagnostics) and moved to more difficult content (lack-of-fit-testing, global f-testing, transformations, ANOVA, marginal effect, coefficient of partial determination, multicollinearity, and more). I found the content interesting and it was fun to learn about. Nothing was too difficult and could always be asked about through office hours. There were homework assignments that corresponded with the lectures that were due every other week. Again, take the time. The course also used R coding for everything that was done. The course also had a couple exams to do. But the biggest thing was the regression project. This required a group of students to get together, find a set of data, and use it to form a regression analysis. There was a lot of coding involved, but it was fun parsing through and wrangling data.
MGMT 375: Real Estate Law (Cecelia Harper)
This course has been super personal and fun to take. This is one of my last courses for the Real Estate minor and I am glad to have taken it. The course goes over any and all laws that relate to real estate in some way. The course talked about property rights, subsurface rights, common laws, easements on land, financing/lending, prenuptial agreements and other contracts. Most grades come from exams, though. There were 3 during the semester plus the final. All exams (except the final) were open note and book. The final we were allowed a 1-page cheat sheet that was front and back. The only grades that did not come from exams were from the contracts we drafted. You create your own lease agreement and purchase agreement, then pair with someone to mesh them together for a new one of each. I think the course is particularly made tho by the professor. She is a practicing real estate lawyer who knows what she is talking about. She would set it up so the class was very personal and we each asked her questions. It was interesting because she could have stories about clients to connect things from class. She would always entertain questions. There was no extra credit, except for when she would randomly do attendance. The course structure could be changing quite a bit now, tho.
MGMT 43901: Real Estate Investment & Development (Michael Eriksen)
The other last course for my real estate minor. This class was a step away from what I thought it was going to be. This course is geared toward commercial development and the business side, as I felt. There was nothing really said about personal/residential property. The course topics included an overview of real estate, ways/types of investment, estimation of cash flows for commercial real estate and finance terms associated, providing loans/financing, the roles of a developer, and taxes. The course didn’t have many plain assignments. These were Excel files with attached questions and instructions. If you could follow the instructions you did well, plus the assignments built on each other, except the last one - this one used ARGUS software. The majority of the work was spent on a case competition (go figure lol). Students were put into groups to select a plot of land to develop for some commercial purpose and provide the financials, timeline, and reasoning for the decision. There were several required tasks to be done for this assignment, plus a presentation at the end. There was no final exam, but there were 2 midterms. You could use an excel sheet with notes throughout, tho. The professor was good. He catered to his students and asked questions about how we thought the class was going. A good class to take.
BCHM 421: R For Molecular Biosciences (Pete Pascuzzi)
I took this class because my previous classes had made me really like working in R. I took the class to continue on with that. If you do not have a basic understanding of R, it may be a slight learning curve. The class only met on Wednesday and Friday for 2 hours. There wasn’t a lecture every class, but there was usually some work to be done. All assignments were done through R and could typically be finished in the class period. If this wasn’t possible, it could usually be finished the next class. The class just showed different things in R, from graphics and data wrangling to how to process gene ontology. There were homeworks and labs, with labs being more involved. There was a midterm that was open resource and a project. The project was done at the very end with groups who put together code from previous lectures/labs to create an RShiny document. The class did have a final, again open resource, but any graduating seniors did not have to take the final. There was an opportunity for extra credit by creating an R notebook for all your notes for functions and lines of code. The professor was also nice, helpful, and willing to put in effort to match you.
ANSC 351: Meat Science (Yuan Kim)
This class is basically just biology plus some extra info for meat processing. If you have taken muscle biology (or just bio) you will do well. The class does have some busy work, tho. The first part of the class was solely muscle biology. After this, the class went into meat quality (including analysis, factors affecting quality, etc.), parts of production (packaging, freezing, heating), slaughter and that process, then into meat safety. The content was interesting to learn and easy to take in. The class did have several assignments. After every class was a lecture quiz, each week there was a reflection, and every so often there was a case study. Case studies involved reading a case and providing a response to address the cause of a problem and fix it. The whole semester, there was a project involving some topic in meat science (novel tech, meat in diet, lab-grown meat, alternatives, etc.). Groups got together at the beginning of the semester to make a decision on the topic. Then, throughout the semester, groups met with TAs, wrote drafts of a paper, critiqued other student papers, and made a presentation to show the class. Throughout the semester, you have to work 2 shifts at the butcher block or write a giant essay on a book, too. The class also required 4 exams and a final. If you showed up to every class, you were able to skip the final. Dr. Kim loves the topic and wants you to learn, but most of the grading will be done by TAs.

EDIT: In response to a comment that there's "something I'm not telling you", I decided to add a section prior to C202 explaining how I used the time after orientation to help me prepare. Contrary to the person's assumptions/accusations, I did not engage in pre-writing, nor did I solicit rubrics, pre-written papers, etc., but I did make use of the time in relevant ways that I will describe further below.
Hi all,
I started my MBA on 4/1 officially, got my capstone final task approved on 4/29, and have successfully filed for my diploma and graduation. I wanted to thank all of the folks on this Reddit, along with those on Facebook (the WGU Business page, as well as the WGU accelerators page) for the information and the support that they've provided, which were a big help in me finishing when I could. Below is a summary of my experience, a couple of tips, and a small description of how I approached each course.
Overall notes
I loved my program mentor overall. One thing I did need to get used to was that she opened C200, C202, and C204 to start, and wouldn't really open courses for me until I finished all of the courses. This was annoying because there were a couple of times early that I needed to wait (it was really like a day or so, but at my pace I didn't want to lose days). So, I needed to establish a pace where I let her know ahead when I finished one course, and she would accelerate the next one while I finished the other (after the first set of three, I pretty much had two at a time open). She did let me choose my sequence after the first 3, so I was strategic on my choices based on what I knew (OA vs Performance Assessment, how I did on the pre-assessment, existing knowledge, etc.). Below are some details on my experience with each, and how I made decisions within each course that ultimately led to my success.
Edit: Added this paragraph below since I remembered it while rewriting the other things.
Tip for the OAs: Sometimes the proctor's aren't available right at the time (e.g., sometimes it's 8:07 for an 8:00 PM and the proceed button isn't available). If it takes too long (which happened to me a couple of times, but some people complained about it a ton on Facebook), I would just use the chat feature on the bottom right and let them know. The couple of times I did this (literally 2 times), they were able to get me started within about 5minutes or so. As a generally rule, I'd plan for about 15-20 minutes longer than your anticipated start time and completion time when you are scheduling your tests. This seemed to piss a lot of people off, but my feeling is if you plan on it being 15-20 minutes longer, then just be patient (you'll be fine waiting a bit, no big deal). I do get that some people are REALLY constrained for time, so I get it, but plan for it and you'll generally be fine with the proctors as long as you follow the rules (in my experience, at least).
Orientation - Completed on 3/15
This was quite easy - just complete all of the required tasks. Was more than I expected to need to do, but was my first experience in seeing the rubrics, the submission system, etc. Was not a big deal.
EDIT: Paragraphs below have been added to describe my use of pre-launch time, a critical phase to my final completion time.
Pre-Launch - 16 days (3/15-3/31)
An important part of my MBA time was some of the work I did during the pre-launch time. I want to emphasize that I used solely information available on the "Class Preview" versions of the site (which allows access to the pre-assessments and the course resource pages, I think). I took all the pre-assessments, passing all of them except for Financial Management, which I failed bit just a little bit. The pre-assessments let me know what areas I was weakest in, which were relevant in helping me determine which areas to focus on. Another thing that I did was be aware of what textbooks were used for the courses (using Reddit, primarily). While I was not able to obtain most of the books (e.g., those posted on 3rd party online sources such as Accounting), I was able to find similar books/older editions that I could use. There isn't really enough time to read all of the textbooks, but I did use some of this time to studying an older version of the book for C202 (a Human Resources book). Because this topic was new to me, I did read more or less the entire book (and because I did not have access to a lot of other stuff). That was the main book I read ahead of time (the other book I read completely was Accounting, another area completely new to me, but I did in fact do that during the term). Other than that reading, the other thing I did was curate all of the resources I could from the course websites about each of the tasks. Reddit provided some info, and the website constructed some info. Note that not all classes have slides/tips on the resources, so for some tasks I was more or less left in the dark (although I could determine from the Reddit posts of others generally what they are. I engaged a lot in "brainstorming" about each of the papers (e.g., if a paper was talking about an individual, I thought about who I would write about and what I would write). I did not, however, prep any materials ahead of time, partially due to the fact that you cannot view any of the rubrics, and it is generally suggested to write to the rubric (which I think is solid advice). One thing I did do that was helpful was copy and paste the instructions into the assignments and fill out my papers kind of like a worksheet (Section A - response for Section A. Section B - responses for Section B... etc.). This helped with ensuring that I met all of the rubric requirements and helped the evaluators find information (I did require a handful of revisions throughout, which I will generally note). The revisions tended not to waste too much time, as I tried to always have a second course open so that I could work on that while I waited for revisions to be approved for the other (you need mentor support in making sure things are open when you need them, and my mentor wouldn't allow me to have more than 2 open at a time, other than at the beginning when I had the first 3 open).
I want to reiterate that I did not have the rubrics ahead of time, write a single page ahead of time, or read through/copy/receive any assignments from anyone else. Every single thing I wrote was my own work, and inspired only by the textbooks and papers I read (in a few small cases). In any case, I used the time to scour the site for any and all information I could use to help me be mentally prepared for the tasks. When 4/1 hit (in fact, several hours into it, because materials don't really launch until noon on the first day typically, which I didn't know ahead of time), I was good to begin my work on the first 3 courses.
C202 - Managing Human Capital (1 OA) - 1 day (4/1)
This was my first OA. I took the pre-assessment and passed, so I felt confident going in. To prep for this course, I read through the whole textbook at a light skim, picked up some things I didn't know before, and focused on particular points I recognized from the PA that I wanted to focus more on (and read more thoroughly in those sections). I took this test on the first evening after my skim/lighter reading and was all set. I could not open other courses at this point, so I continued with C200, which was already open, but would require more time (as it was a PA course).
C200 - Managing Organizations and Leading People (2 PA tasks, both papers) - 4 days from open (4/4)
This course required two performance assessments, as well as a leadership assessment (CliftonStrengths) as part of one of the tasks. These were both very manageable tasks. I spent the most time in this class reading through a couple of papers to find good sources (this was actually one of the few that I had to/bothered to do this in). These look me a bit longer than average to complete compared to the others, so it took me a couple of days to get it done. In terms of reading, I looked at the materials related to the tasks (and the relevant papers). I did not look at any of the other course materials. After finishing this, I had C211 opened.
C211 - Global Economics for Managers (1 OA) - 2 days (4/6)
I passed this pre-assessment as well (although more marginally), so I wanted to take this one out. Apparently, a lot of people do find this test hard, but I did take Economics in college, and have made some efforts to learn some of these things on my own in the past. I focused on a read/skim approach on my areas of weakness from the pre-assessment, and was able to pass this pretty quickly (2 days after opening it). Test was absolutely fine, but my light approach to reading (only reading a couple of small areas) led to only a marginal improvement from the pre-assessment to the OA, but it was a solid pass, so it was good enough. With this done, I focused on C204 (my last remaining class). I think I was slowed down a bit, as my mentor made me wait until finishing C204 before I could continue (which annoyed me a bit, but forced me to focused on that next).
C204 - Management Communication (2 tasks - 1 paper, and 1 presentation/video/executive summary) - 8 days (4/8)
This one took me a bit longer because the work was a bit more extensive. I also was traveling on 4/2-4/4, and on 4/5, so I was only able to do this on 4/8 after I was done traveling (as I needed to make a video presentation). These tasks were more extensive, so there was a lot more work involved. I relied on the textbook only, and focused exclusively on the sections related to the tasks. I maybe BARELY did a light skim on other materials, but honestly skipped a lot of it, as it was not relevant to what I needed to do. The tasks ultimately went down pretty easily (once I sat down to do them). I had to slow down a lot because of all the traveling and needing to shoot the video, but things sped up a bit from here for a while. This allowed me to open up C215.
C215 - Operations Management (1 OA) - 1 day (4/9)
For this one, I BARELY touched the book (except for some last minute skimming the last hour before the exam). I passed the pre-assessment (barely), so I felt ok, but I focused on watching Dr. Haywood's videos on youtube (which tons of people recommended). Watching these boosted my knowledge about the area quite a bit (although he doesn't really touch any of the math, which isn't needed anyways). I was able to pass this OA immediately pretty much because I had watched all the videos. With that knowledge, it was pretty easy. The videos are very easy to understand and help with the OA a lot, so I HIGHLY recommend watching them (and use the book as a supplement too, if you need/want to). After this, I had C206 opened, and C207 opened (I was able to get two courses at a time by this point, which allowed me some flexibility in working on tasks)
C206 - Ethical Leadership (3 PAs - all papers) - 4 days (4/13, including revision time)
This one required a LOT of writing, as it is three papers! That said, a lot is based on other materials (case study, ethical leadership inventory, code of ethics), and so I barely touched the course text materials at all. I just diligently wrote and got everything done. I had to do a couple of revisions here because there was a lot to write and I missed a couple of things here and there, but it was easy once I knew what was missing to fill in the gaps. Revisions took me an extra day or so (one happened on day 3 for a task I submitted earlier, and another happened on day 4, which was what moved me to 4 days for the course. After this, I went to C207, which I already had open.
C207 - Data-Driven Decision Making (1 OA, 2 PAs) - 5 days after open (4/14, including revision time)
I have a lot of expertise and experience and did well on the pre-assessment, so I looked at pretty much nothing here. I was able to do the two PAs pretty quickly, but also quickly realized that I didn't know what they were asking for in places (I felt the wording was strange). I had to resubmit both of these, and even had to do one of them a total of 3 times to pass. These also, for some reason, required getting instructor approval. This was the one course I worked with the prof but I did take advantage of it by asking them to look at the work. They gave me some tips that were helpful in terms of understanding what they wanted and I was able to pass (although it took more revisions across the board than any other course). Without studying, I took the OA, and was able to pass that (although I scored about the same as the pre-assessment, which makes sense). The OA was harder than I Was expecting, so I was a bit disappointed. Nevertheless, I finished this and was able to move on to C212.
C212 - Marketing (1 PA) - 1 day (4/15)
This class required one pretty long paper. I looked at only the materials related to the paper and nothing else. I wrote the paper in about 4 hours, I think (ignoring my actual job that day...oops). I passed quite easily in one attempt (just was a lot of writing). This allowed me to move on to C213
C213 - Accounting for Decision-makers (1 OA) - 7 days (4/22)
I was a bit concerned about this course, as it was pretty much all brand new to me, and because I knew it was considered one of the two hardest classes (behind Financial management). For this one, I read the book cover to cover. I had passed the pre-assessment marginally using prior knowledge, but reading the book helped a ton, and I passed the OA fairly easily after all the studying. I had gone out of town for a few days again, so it took some time before I could sit for the exam. I used a few days to read all of the book pages, and then used the rest of the time to focus on C214 before sitting for this exam.
C214 - Financial Management (1 OA) - 1 day (4/23)
This was the one pre-assessment I failed (barely), and I knew this was a hard course. After opening the course, I learned that the videos provided on the site (rather than the book) were the most useful materials. I basically read through a few chapters while working through the accounting, and then switched to the videos after learning about them. The videos (posted on the course site) were about 4.5 hours or so, and were all I studied other than those few chapters I read before. I did not watch the additional 1 hour calculations video that was also available because I felt I knew enough. That said, there was a LOT of math on the OA, and I honestly didn't know how to get the calculator (I had the TI BA II recommended calculator). That all said, I passed with a pretty good score (I think I may have guessed well in a few places where I couldn't figure out the calculator as well. I sat for this exam one day after C213, and was done with this course. This test took me like 1 hour and 40 minutes total (far longer than any other exam, which generally ranged from 30-60 minutes for me). But I passed and moved forward, leaving only the capstone.
C216 - MBA Capstone (3 PAs) - 4 days (4/27)
For this, there was a business simulation and two associated tasks, as well as a profession portfolio PA. I had pretty much everything I needed for the portfolio, so this took a couple of hours to knock out and prepare for submission. However, I did need to finish the simulation and the two tasks first. Task 2 must be completed after Task 1 is passed, so I did task 1's simulation part and finished the task, and had to wait a day before getting to Task 2. After that, I finished the simulation (which I thought was an AMAZING way to integrate all that I studied and learned), and then completed Task 2. Both of these tasks passed within one attempt, and I submitted Task 2 simultaneously with Task 3, and my last days just involved waiting for approval, which happened yesterday (4/29).
After all this, I filled out the graduation paperwork and am waiting on that. With all that, I completed my work within 27 days, and am slated for graduated after 29. It was quite a road, and a lovely experience. I'd love to study more if it wouldn't cost another 5k, and am eager to see what's next.
I'm happy to share this with all of you, and am also happy to answer any questions that anyone might have! I would highly recommend this process, especially for motivated folks who can work well independently, and hope that I can use what I've learned for my work in the near future!

this is going to be long probably but i have nobody to talk to rn and i really need to get everything out while im calm. i am in no way self diagnosing for starters. ive read some things here and there about bpd and ive had similar reactions and such so i figured somebody with bpd could understand me more than anybody else hopefully. im in a really bad spot mentally. my life is absolute shit rn and it feels like nothing ever goes right yk. i have intense mood swings where one day im so happy and the world is so good and the next day im seconds away from sh/actually ending everything. i have a boyfriend and he’s genuinely the most beautiful person ive ever met. i got kicked out on my 18th bday last year and i only have a part time job. no car no license, etc. he drives me everywhere, lends me money, he does absolutely everything for me and i really do love him. but sometimes i feel like i hate him? maybe not hate but i get a strong distaste. he’ll do something small like not compliment me enough and suddenly he hates me, he’s using me. i know he loves me and i trust him but i get into these moods where i see him as the enemy. ill scream at him and accuse him of things and threaten to breakup. i never mean any of these things but i feel like im not myself when i get angry/he does something i even slightly dislike. ill come to my senses like 30 minutes late and ill be all lovey dovey again and i realize im in the wrong but i couldnt stop myself? theres times where ill find a reason for me to hate him. ill go through his following, make up scenarios in my head just to feel like he doesn’t love me. like i want him to leave me? my entire family ghosted me after i got kicked out so i feel like im dealing with a lot of abandonment issues rn because of that and my dad being in and out of my life since i was a child. everybody leaves me. out of everybody i know, he’s the only person whose stayed. i feel like eventually he’ll leave like everybody else. i say and do mean things to him so he’ll leave me but he never does. i cant go a minute without him no matter how hard i try so thats why i push him away. so he’ll leave me. i started feeling depression like 4/5 years ago and i never got out of it. i try to make myself sad or angry because those emotions are all i know. they are comforting to me. i dont want to hurt him anymore. i need help, professional help but i have no way of getting it i have nobody on my side rn it feels like. im so tired of being myself. i am not asking for a diagnosis or anything like that, i am simply asking for any help or advice i can get. no coping mechanisms help me and i dont like talking to therapists. all the ones ive been to just give me worksheets of the same stuff over and over that do not help. if anybody relates to this and has any tips pls lmk thank you. (btw sorry if this post seems scattered i tried to cover everything i could but everything would probably lead to a whole essay)

***ORIGINAL POST***
We're moving from Portland, OR to Atlanta the week of July 4th. I know this is peak season and a full-service national van line is going to be spendy. We've budgeted $20k max for the move, not including shipping our cars. We are paying for it ourselves and we've come to grips with the expense.
All that said, we've had three moving companies come out and give us quotes, each affiliated with a national shipper-- Mayflower, North American, and Allied. I'm sitting with all three quotes and trying to make sense of them. All three are binding estimates. All three are based on an in-home walk through and include a detailed inventory sheet. All three have roughly comparable insurance.
We're moving a four bedroom house, but we're selling 3 bedrooms worth of furniture and our large sectional sofa, so its really a bunch of boxes and a relative handful of big items. We are doing all of the packing ourselves and purchasing packing supplies from uhaul. Using an online worksheet, I guessed our total weight at around 6,500-7000 lbs after we purge the stuff we're not shipping.
This is what we got back as quotes:
Mayflower-- 8,500 lbs (215 items, 1,214.3 ft³), $18,808 all-in (with no transparency about additional costs (e.g. insurance, shuttles)). NO DEPOSIT. BINDING.
Allied-- 12,305 lbs (324 items 1,893 ft3), $17,001 all-in (~$2,400 of which is broken out as specific fees for a pickup shuttle, insurance, a mattress bag, etc). NO DEPOSIT. BINDING.
North American-- 6,573lbs (172 items 939 ft³), $11,482 all-in ($460 of which is broken out as specific fees for insurance and a mattress bag but only a destination shuttle is included in the bid). 20 PERCENT DEPOSIT. BINDING.
The quotes all came from affiliated movers in the Portland metro area. They each have comparable YELP reviews (a mix of 5 stars and 1 stars that doesn't feel like a huge red flag).
North American also provided a decent quote for our two cars and they'll handle the whole thing in one transaction, which I like, but I'm pretty nervous about how much lower they were on weight than others. I also expect I *will* need an Origin shuttle, which will at $1300-$1500 on to the North American bid.
I have some time to make this decision. I can definitely ask more questions. What should I do?
***UPDATE***
After asking questions to all three van lines per the suggestions below, we decided on Allied. They offered the best dates and I liked how responsive the rep was. They also helped us figure out our car situation. The didn't move down on the weight on the cube sheet-- they are still *by far* the heaviest estimate, but the price per pound was low enough that we ended up with a higher weight but lower overall cost than Mayflower.

BNA Income Tax Planner has a W-4 worksheet built into the program. I ran a projection then prepared the worksheet.
I don't understand what it's doing.
It's coming up with 299k for line 4b, extra deductions but these people don't itemize. Of course they don't have a way to drill down on the calculation.
I wish I knew how the W-4 translates to the paycheck now. The line 4c, extra withholding, amount makes sense, though.

It's been a while since I've posted. Things got better the past month, with the fruits of mindfulness.
I want to share with the community my personal anecdote, with what was key for me and how the seemingly inert practice on those worksheets that psychs gave me has benefit.
The first key insight is that who I am is not a paragraph that I can write to you. It is not a story. It is not a roleplay. It is not my memories. It is not any idea of what characteristics I do or don't have.
This is because, those are thoughts. Who I am is not so fake and transient as thoughts. Thoughts are basically like farts and should be treated as such.
The second insight is that mindfulness is a safe space. Let's look at the status quo and then look at how mindfulness changes it.
Imagine a dungeon cell. In there there's you, and in a dark corner, you can vaguely sense a child. And the sad reality is that you abuse that child. It's existence is so abhorrent to you that you demand it stay silent and in the darkness, and you don't care how it feels. If it makes any noise you cause it more pain.
That dark imagery is fitting for how I was treating myself and am still conditioned to treat myself. It's shame. Deep shame is at the core of this.
Mindfulness, changing this status quo, says "hey, I see you in there, and I'm here for you if you want to show yourself. I'll help you and take care of you because I want you to feel at ease." This is the re-parenting therapists mention sometimes.
So I sit and watch for how I feel in my body and I try to embrace it like that. This is instead of self-abuse. And I've been able to connect with this disconnected part, and how it shows up in my body and mind.
So "who am I?" does not have an answer that can be written. But it does have an answer.
I speculate that the disorder of self in BPD and CPTSD is basically a conditioning to deeply shame the true self that's in that dark corner, and to look out of those iron bars at the passers by and try to become a child to them and be what they want, instead of being an adult to the child inside.
To put it concretely, take a look at polyvagal theory. Conceive of states of hyperarousal and hypoarousal as the pain of that inner child. And know that I was able to remediate this by being mindful without hate but with compassion.
The mindfulness is not "I'm look at you so that you can shut up and get back in the corner and leave me alone."
The mindfulness is "I'm really here for you. I have space for you. I'll never leave you, we're together forever."
Somatically, it caused me to relax like I had never relaxed before.
Hope that made some sense to someone. It's a personal anecdote, not advice.
Hope everyone is well and happy and at ease. Take care of yourselves.