Engineering Update #2 – Midterm

The past couple days, I’ve been trying to reset my sleep schedule—aiming to wake up at 8:30 a.m. again. For most of the semester, my sleep schedule has been all over the place. I’ve been sleeping between 1 and 4 am, and waking up between 11 am and 1 pm. My main incentive behind resetting my sleep schedule is to try and start my day on a more positive and productive note.

Over these past few days, most of my time has gone into studying for my ECE 3200 Microelectronics midterm. The professor told us the exam would cover both Class B amplifiers and differential amplifiers, but when I opened the test today, it was one large circuit, consisting of a multistage differential amplifying MOSFET circuit, cascading into a BJT mirror current generator.

At initial glance, I began to feel a deep sense of panic creep in, but I tried to focus on breathing and regulate myself a bit before starting. I was able to get into a calmer state, regardless of the fact that I still didn’t feel fully prepared; however, I told myself I’d figure out a way to get something on paper, and hopefully solve it one way or another. So, I laid out all my materials: my cheat sheet, a calculator, and a pen, and began the test.

Image of my cheatsheet

After half an hour, a few people handed in their exams early, and I panicked a bit. Were they just that fast? Or did they give up? I took a few deep breaths, and focused back to my paper, and reminded myself that how others do is irrelevant, and I needed to just keep working. By the time it ended, I felt okay about it. The professor handed out the answer key right after submitting the test, and based on what I remember writing down, I hope I’ll get about half of it right. In most classes, this would be worrisome, but in an engineering course, a 50% might get you an above-average score. To ease the lingering stress, I asked the Discord to get the opinions of my classmates, and most people seem to be on the same page, the test was pretty difficult.

At this point, the test is over, and the grading is out of my control, so theres no real reason to stress anymore. I get my grade back on Monday, and all I can hope for is a good grade.

Outside of my schoolwork, I started reading again. I picked up a book I’ve had for a while, just never read, Good Vibes, Good Life by Vex King. I’m about 50 pages in, and so far I’ve enjoyed the book. One quote that stuck with me so far is,

“Daily Goal: Be better than who I was yesterday”

A very simple idea, but powerful, and also much easier said than done. Whether that means reading more, working out, or getting back into my projects, I want to find small ways to keep improving. Even if today wasn’t perfect, trying to have the mentality that tomorrow will be better is really motivating.

Over the next few days, I hope to destress a little by working on my project some more, and hopefully, I will have some exciting updates to come along with that. Until next time!