Frazz by Jef Mallett for August 16, 2016

He’s waaaaay ahead of you, Frazz. Just give it up and swim!

You’re kidding, right? English lit in college was one of the easier classes I ever had. Easy A, and that A got me out of taking the stoopid composition exam that was required to graduate. Better find another college level class if you want to challenge him. Try organic chem, 300 level, or calculus, or physics..

I think that depends a lot on the lit class and even more on who’s teaching it. I’ve never had a hard one, but I’ve heard some “interesting” stories of the “better you than me” type.

For me, it wasn’t structure, it was brand new pencils and notebooks and new school clothes. And, goblue, first class in college that I didn’t float through was Astronomy, causing my instructor to say to my roommate “She isn’t too bright, is she?” It was the only C I ever got.

Our society spends tons of money trying to bring up the low end of the curve, apparently figuring that the bright kids will find things to do on their own, not doing the cost/benefit that a single good teacher would keep a whole class full of bright kids busy and out of trouble and – important part – PRODUCTIVE.

Calc 3. I went to a “magnet” high school in NYC, so the first year of engineering school was just more of the same. Then I hit the third semester of calculus and it fell on me like a brick wall. But it was still not as bad as the people who had been valedictorian or salutatorian of their county high school back home, showed up at RPI figuring they were hot stuff, and were lost within a week.

I think he has the right idea. Swimming builds discipline. School is done on your bottom and he wants to move.

I graduated valedictorian from high school. My first mid-term report card in college was a 1.9 GPA. Talk about a wake-up call! (I got it up to 3.5 by end of term and never looked back.)

I suppose it depends on how challenging your high school was and how challenging college was. I found college to be quite easy after high school, though a lot of that was probably the fact that most of my classes were actually focused on something I was interested in instead of pointless stuff like english, history, or literature.

I did much better grade wise in college than in high school.

Caulfield clearly is gifted, but he may be just a bit young for AP classes yet. Maybe he could find some type of after-school program?