The class you did the worst in?

[Monkeyleg]

I didn't want to interrupt the discussion about thermo-whatevers by talking about less mind-boggling classes. But which class did you ever score the worst in?

For me it was shop class. Give me a piece of wood and any kind of tool, and it's a disaster just waiting to happen. The shop class teacher gave me a D, since he didn't want to ruin what was otherwise a very, very good GPA.

I also didn't do particularly well in the one art class I took, which was odd, since I could draw better than most people. Also odd because I later became a successful photographer.

[grislyatoms]

Marine science.

I loved the subject matter, but this class came right after lunch and there was this sun beam that hit me just perfectly through the window.

ZZZZzzzzzzZZZZZZzzzzzz.

[MillCreek]

Physical chemistry.

[Unisaw]

Believe it or not, Music 101 -- music appreciation.  I took it my first year of college and didn't really know how to study for it.

[J.J.]

Spanish

I have retaken each spanish that I am required to take atleast once if not more.

[Marnoot]

A Managerial Economics class I had to take for my major. Not only was I superbly bored by the subject matter, the professor had a monotone voice and a superbly un-interesting method of teaching. I generally slept through the class in the back row. I managed to pass the class with 50 whole points to spare.

[SpookyPistolero]

I got an E (F) in an intro to psychology course once. I aced every exam, but was also working nights. I missed a handful of classes, and didn't know that if you missed more than 3 in class quizzes, you automatically failed. I can imagine few obituaries I would read with as much satisfaction as that professor's.

[garyk/nm]

Basic undergrad chem (10x). I was doing well in advanced math, physics, and other related ME courses, and this SOB brought me to my knees.

[Iain]

School - French.
College - Krebs cycle stuff in biology. Probably biology all round, but did ok in the end.
University - economic history. Just because I hated it. The module I ended up writing an essay about infanticide for was pretty bad too.

[spinr]

Philosophy 101 in college.

Most. boring. class. ever.

I absolutely couldn't stand it.

There were three things that contributed to me bombing the hell out of that class.

The professor being a complete & utter fruit.  Me not caring about the subject matter in the least.  And it being scheduled for 2:00 P.M, right when my afternoon napage kicked in.

If it were possible to get less than an F in that class, I would have.

[Guest]

American Lit.

[Sindawe]

In public school: Pre-Calculus my senior year.

In undergrad: Calculus (required for my degree).  Had to take it twice to get a decent grade.

Biology (organismal and molecular), Chemistry (inorganic, organic and bio) and Physics (only took Newtonian) were all a modest challenge to master, but no real struggle. Beyond Algebra?  I simply don't have the head for advanced mathematics.

[Werewolf]

Sociology. I was an adult student - just got out of the Army which changed me from a bleeding heart lib to a conservative. The moron Prof teaching the course never held a real job in his life and his exposure to the real world was almost totally academic.

Needless to say we didn't get along and when I wouldn't regurgitate the crap he vomited forth - well - I was lucky to get a C. Lowest grade I ever got in my college career.

In HS Calculus blew me away - barely passed. The wierd thing is when I took it in college it all made sense and I got an A. Seems like my brain processed all that HS material offline and when I took it again it was a piece of cake.

[SomeKid]

I missed a handful of classes, and didn't know that if you missed more than 3 in class quizzes, you automatically failed. I can imagine few obituaries I would read with as much satisfaction as that professor's.

Man, that sucks. My PSY101 prof did not care if we ever came to class. We could literally skip every class, and still get an A. (Grades based purely on tests.)

For me, it would have to be any art/foriegn language type class. If I have to draw, I am dead. If it involves saying stuff in another language, it ain't happening. It all sounds like 'bar bar bar bar' to me.

[Antibubba]

Math.  Period.

But the one that appalled me to fail was Deductive Logic.  Even with tutoring, it was completely beyond me.  I still think they gave me a Philosophy degree anyway just to get rid of me.

[DrAmazon]

High School: Calculus
College:  Did great in calculus, got a D in Organic Chemistry I the first time I took it.  Re-took it my junior year, one year older and with a much clearer idea of WHY I was in college.  Fixed the grade, got on Dean's List and stayed on it until I graduated.

I am currently a Chemistry Professor, teaching Organic Chemistry!!!

[Vodka7]

In high school, easily AP Calculus.  My friend John and I were in a never-ending competition to see who would get the worst grade in the class, and who would get the second to worst.  (Although, admittedly, it became a very, very crowded field by the end of the year and neither of us ended up with the worst final average.)  I remember for our final project we spent hours and hours locked in the library with every calculus book we could find while trying to work our way through the nine most devious calculus problems our teacher was able to invent.  (Even though there was a lot of cheating going on in the class, neither of us ever did.  The fact that we weren't able to, because no one would ever, ever want to copy from us, may have played a part in that.)

In college, I'd probably have to say the James Joyce class I took.  The first two weeks were easy enough--all I had to do was read The Odyssey for about the sixth time in my schooling career.  But after that, it was Ulysses, and nothing but Ulysses.  And I have never struggled so hard in my life to write such bad papers.  One time I lurched in to class after an especially hair pulling episode, unshaven, unwashed, to hand in my paper, and he greated me with "Ahhh, Mr. McGinn, fresh off the presses I presume?"  To which I wittily replied "Hrghmmbldgrgrgr" and flopped in a seat in the shade.

For I reason I never fully figured out, he still gave me an A in the class, despite my papers never having gotten better than a B+.  I think my girlfriend at the time reminded him of one of his ex-wives and he just took pity on me.

[JAlexander]

It depends if we're talking about bad grades through incomprehension or through instructor malice.  If we're talking about the former, I bombed a lot of math classes because I can't wrap my brain around algebra, but the one I feel the worst about was the F I got in Spanish Phonetics and Phonemics.  I went though college acing every Spanish class I took, and the I cam smack up against phonetics.  For some reason, I just couldn't make it work, and it drove me crazy.  The worst part was that I'd had the professor before, and we were buddies, but I was so lost there was nothing he could do.  The one that still pisses me off was one of the Spanish Literature classes I took; as best I recall, it was all modern stuff, and not bad in any way, but the professor and I didn't get along.  She was one of those teachers who wanted to see her lectures re-written on the tests, and I couldn't seem to do that.  As a result, my tests and papers came back covered in red ink and my work savagely picked apart.  I never got better than a C on anything, and barely passed.  Horrible woman.  

Now that I think back on it, those two experiences contributed to me dropping out of college.  On the other hand, I did finally go back and graduate, and y'all cannot imagine my joy when I found that that phonetics class was no longer part of the graduation requirements.  Huzzah.

James

[Guest]

She's the same one that taught my American Lit class.

[MillCreek]

I am currently a Chemistry Professor, teaching Organic Chemistry!!!

So is Morrison and Boyd still the standard text?

(Owner of a MSc in analytical chemistry from way, way back in the early 80's.  So long ago that  I used an Apple IIc to drive the gas chromatograph/mass spectrometer for my thesis work.)

[Monkeyleg]

There was a course in college that I definitely should have flunked. It was a PhD level literature course, and I got a waiver to take it as a sophomore.

The course was all about "anti-story," a style of literature that was very unconventional.

The class consisted of the usual beret-wearing, pipe-smoking intellectuals that I'd see at East Side coffee houses. I quickly grew bored with the class, and irritated at the students, as they had no grasp of the real world.

Our semester project was to write a story emulating the style of John Barth (IIRC), the author who started the style of anti-story.

So, I wrote my story. In it, I described every member of the class, including the professor. And using some very obscene terms. I insulted every one of them.

The next week, the professor--Cam Tathum--cradled the students' papers in his arm. He held up my story.

"This..." he said. I was waiting for the hammer to fall.

"This is IT!"

I aced the class by insulting the professor and the students.

What a maroon.

[mfree]

Monkeyleg,

I bet every single paper that professor ever got that described him or the other students was some snivelling suck-up piece. You stole the show

[Mabs2]

Math/Algebra.
Especially in High School.
Failed the first Algebra class you can get twice...finally made it through the third time.

[Monkeyleg]

mfree, I remember reading some of the other student's writings. They were legitimate attempts to copy John Barth's style, but fell short. For whatever reason, it was easy for me to imitate.

One thing about so-called "intellectuals" is that they're so focused on esoterics that the plainly obvious escapes them. Or, as George Orwell said, "some ideas are so outrageous that they can only be embraced by intellectuals."

Slice-of-life anecdote: about the same time I was taking the literature class, I ran into my film history professor at a supermarket.

I was standing before rows and rows of Campbell's soup cans, trying to find the cheddar cheese soup that, combined with a box of noodles, constituted my diet.

I remarked to her that it would be much easier to find the soup, and Campbell's would probably sell more of their products, if each soup had a distinctive label, rather than the generic Campbell's logo.

She just looked at me like I'd just stepped off an alien spacecraft.

[Perd Hapley]

In college, I'd probably have to say the James Joyce class I took.

If forced to take a class on that hack, I'd fail in protest.