Actually I know why I am there, at this particular school and programme and I highly appreciate being there. I will never regret that and I a grateful for this opportunity. There are teachers and people that gave me lessons that are really important. Education is not only about knowledge and skill as many people believe in this country. What I need is to explore who I am and what is in me and to go my own way. All this is good but there is one person at the school that I dislike (and he can read this if he likes) and I have a really hard time listening to him. Not that I would ignore him, I listen but I won't probably look like that. Anyway the problem with this person is...that he was the head of the programme and he's the one having the final word. My last 15 weeks of school will be with him. During that night there were many things that were slowing surfacing ... until they surfaced. (follows, hopefully this will help me with my anger a bit.)
Here's my story. I signed up for Interactive Media programme few years ago. One of the thing that interests me is 3d modeling and character design. It is something I wanted to do and never managed to self educate myself well enough to be able to do something like that. I needed guidance for that. This programme has classes teaching animation, 3d modeling and animation in 3d. Two of these classes are taught by this person. This class was supposed to be the most difficult one and I dedicated 90% of my time for this goddamn class. It brought some fruit and probably not of a great quality but I learned a lot during that time. Unfortunately I never received a feedback for any of my submitted work. Not verbal, nor written. I was really sad about this and later pretty angry after several meetings about this matter. I SHOULD HAVE FILED and official complain about this and send it to Teesside. I regret not doing that.
There were other episodes of me running amok because of this person. We had classes rescheduled. The dates were already bad for majority of the class and the time (8am) was a killer for some. No matter what (I don't miss classes just because I don't want to go there or something) I got up at 5:20am and left for school. I was let in at 7:40 by Ken and waited till 8:10. At that time I was the only student for the class there. Few more arrived later and we started looking for the professor (one also not living in Prague). We came to ask the reception and we called him several times (the reception). His cell phone was turned off though. Ken also was looking for him at several places and did not find him. At 10:30 or so we left the class room and went for a coffee. I was furious. I spent 62 + 60 + [insert coffee price] CZK to get to the school. It cost me 7 hours of time. All this would be ok if one more thing did not happen. When I arrived home I checked my email. There was a message from the teacher.
Dear All,
Because I was alone in class at 8.00 I decided to leave and to reach thour workshop in the Studio.
If you have any problem to finish your assignments, you ll find me there next days. If any question or help needed, let's join me there.
Regarding the QTVR, only complete the tutorial i created on moodle. You'll find there the tools you need to finalize it.
Best wishes,
[his name]
I was in the studio at 10, he wasn't there. No matter what I was at school from 7:30. I've seen every person coming to school before 8 and he wasn't one of them.
Regarding the mentioned QTVR whatever it is. You don't need to know what that is. At the previous lesson(s) that were at the worst possible time ever, he told us that because we don't have enough time to finish everything we don't need to do part one of the assignment. Too bad for those who heard those words and did not do that because our work was given back to us, without any possibility of getting a good grade. I WAS FURIOUS, SERIOUSLY. I thought I would cut his throat or just kick him till he would start asking me for mercy.
I was avoiding classes with this person for a long time till I had to take another class ran by him. I was coming to the lessons, listened and started working on my VJ project. After coming to class where our teacher wasn't present (because he was too busy - yeah, cool) or classes in which we had no information that could help up I decided to entirely work at home. I needed to record quite a lot of videos and set my computer to run everything and figure out a way how to mix the videos online and well following pre-mixed music. It was fun doing that and it was worth doing that. When the time for us to prepare everything for the show came we did not get any information regarding it. The lesson that was obligatory and should not be missed was one I came to hoping to get some information. (The information in moodle were more than one year old and the assignment briefs were really off. So we really needed information from him directly). The teacher did not show up though and we stayed there and continued working on our projects. The next lesson. He came in a hurry 30 minutes late already telling us that we need to have our works ready and copied to this and that computer. He left afterwards and left us alone. We arranged everything under the guidance of Peter Marencik and one more student (forgive me, I can't remember who it was - but the person SHOULD BE NAMED and should be given credit for that).
Few days before the show, I met the teacher several times. He was asking people if they could come to HIS show and see it. My anger was at a stage where I couldn't control it.
I came to the bar where we had our show and I started helping with the installation. After some time we went to get something to eat before our performaces. Jorge one of the other teachers was there as well. I told him about my concernes with the other teacher and I told him that I'm not sure if I want to show some of the videos that took. They were rather more personal and geeky. (my performance had two parts - dancing one - para para dancing and a gaming one - videos of me playing different music games). I did not get any feedback about anything I've done so far so I wasn't sure about anything. I just want to get over it.
The other teacher also promised us that he would take footage of the whole thing and he would give us the videos later - they were needed for the assignment submission and I'm sad we didn't get the footage. But about that later in the text.
After a short talk with Jorge I found some motivation and energy in me to go to the stage and do my thing. It started well, I was dancing correctly and the video effects were looking good. Somewhere near 2/3s I put in the music games videos which brought even more attention to my performance. People liked it I heard many other people who were saying that was good. Who knows maybe it was.
I've seen the teacher this post is all about. He was drinking (probably alcohol), talking to another teacher not even watching or really listening. I was deceived.
After the show we were waiting for the tape from the camera. We didn't get any information. The only we got was that there's something wrong with it. A week after submission date, on Thursday, through Facebook we learned that the tape is bad and the data is lost. I submitted everything late, which resulted in a failed class. I NEVER received any feedback. All I have I know is that my performance had a great success and no one probably read or went through what I submitted. After this I decided to keep the last class with this teacher for the last trimester. I did not want to see this person again.
The last trimester came quite fast and I had to sign up for the Advanced 3d Modeling class. The good news was that the teacher was not the only one running the class. That brought some hope to me. Maybe I would get a feedback or a better grade than Fail or Pass without any given reason.
There were two parts - one modeling and the other was something about doing a website and some javascript. I don't remember that much, but I pretty much ignore that as I don't have a problem with ... well creating a simple website with some scripts included. The final project is this -> Outpost Model
I did not manage to finish the project as the time given for the assignment was really short. I worked hard and was becoming sick on regular basis because of staring into 3dsmax for too long (I can't blame anyone for this, it's because of my eye defect). This was a problem as I couldn't look at the screen for two days when this happened and I needed to get the work done - not to mention that I'm a complete noob using 3dsmax. Ok, I've got some experience with it..but not big. Anyway I uploaded my stuff and submitted my assignment.
I didn't get feedback. But this time I also got a different grade - Distinction - and I highly doubt that this was because of the teacher I'm writing about and in the end I also have no idea what for I got this grade. Was my project worth it?
So why I write about all this? One reason is the one already mentioned - the next 15 weeks mean that I'll be regularly meeting this person and I'll have to listen to what he has to say and I will have to cooperate. There is another reason though. Due to these experiences I decided to give up in trying to be good or to please someone. I do the assignments and do what I want - I do this for myself. I don't care about the grade. Because of this my grade from one class was lowered. Because I WON'T do something PLUS when the school should be providing that and help me with that. The teacher for that class told me that this is a lack of critical thinking and that even though he would give me Distinction he can't due to my attitude. He was right. He gave me a lesson but it won't change anything on my attitude. I wrote this to him later. I was well aware of what my action (in this case inactivity) would provoke and I was aware of possible consequences, but due to this goddamn teacher (the one this whole post is about) I really did not give a damn. Just screw it. Ok Distinction gone...I am Merits and Disctinctions material, but there are people I just can't stand. Anyway thanks to this teacher there things that actually started moving at school. There were additional responsabilities added to student book and the teachers were supposed to take their own responsabilities seriously. Since this day and this teachers action things got better. So my ignorance and strike was actually worth something in the end.
And the last reason and probably the most important is this: after experiences with this person I completely gave up on what I wanted to do for years and I can't get over it for some reason. This is the most sad thing about all this. I tried really hard for nothing. That's how I feel and I can't find the motivation or will to start doing that once again. Now there is an exhibition project ahead of me and it should be something featuring interactive media. Will I find the strength to do it? Motivation? Will I be able to endure all that what is inside me and do something I'd like? I have to weeks to come up with my idea. Due to all that contained in this post my first semester ended up in a completely different direction. A direction I want to continue, but a direction I can't be serious about just yet as my skill lacks a lot and I'm in the period of finding who I am.
Thanks for reading
Big thanks goes to Jorge who helped me through part of all this. He's the one, who can really motivate and I will always be grateful for that and I will never forget that.
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