Schols Schols Schols, information and venting thread.

frisbeeface

xeduCat wrote: »

I am, but sitting them once was enough! Sorry. If you have the bad fortune to be in my seminar group, though (Constitutional Law 2), we will talk about Schol there though

I'm not in your seminar group but since I missed my usual one this week I may well end up there this week!

xeduCat wrote: »

It's not too bad. I took three of the four SF subjects for Schol (aside to general readership: each course differs in terms of the rules for exams and for examptions - law requires you to do five exams (out of the eight subjects that are required in JF/SF), but only grants exemptions in subjects you take. Doing one subject in the summer exams is still much better than doing four!

Chilling at the pav in the sunshine would be a lot better if I didn't have land law hanging over my head!

What difference do you think Gerard Hogan's departure will make for Con I? I found him a fairly easy marker - have heard that Oran Doyle is far tougher.

sully-gormo

What do you need to do for HPT and WEP, im completely lost in them, I didnt do politics last year, I did Maths and Economics and switched to BESS Econ/Pol

europerson

HPT: you need to pick four topics and know them inside out, mostly in terms of the reading itself and a few critiques.

WEP: you need to be a readings and statistics crazy-person. What I mean there is you need to read everything on the topics you think you're going to cover.

The problem with Politics is that you need to do very little reading to understand it, but you need to do much reading to get through exams in the subjects.

Awayindahils

In Politics limit what your are going to answer on in the exam. pick 4 topics in HPT and 4/5 in WEP depending on how brave you are. Then shut out the rest of the course and read till your eyes bleed in each of the topics. GML is the basics of everything for WEP but not even breaking the surface of what you need for schol. Become the very best of friends with JSTOR and just read a lot.

paperclip

3 weeks to go! Argh!
NOT. ENOUGH. TIME.

sully-gormo

Yep, need need need more time. What are the timetables like, does anyone have ones from last year they could put up? When did they come out last year?

The exam papers from last year have the dates & times on them.

ZWEI_VIER_ZWEI

Not going for schols this year, because I applied last year and didn't attend, so I figured there was no point in signing up this year. I reckon if I went for them though I'd have a fighting chance. Good luck for anyone who's going for them!

manicmonoliths

For choosing 2nd year subjects for BESS which would be the 'easiest' to get Schols in. I'm sure I want to do Single Honours Economics so I've got 3 picked on the basis of that. Maths and Stats, Econ of Ireland and Inter.Econ.

Please don't say 'Pick what you like the most.' I'm set on Single Honours Econ so the rest I'm picking based on Schol maxing. Is Econ of Public Policy easy?

I'm not too good in the essay writing department, so anything that's done on a simple right or wrong answer system is what I'm looking for. Anything subjective would just slow me down.:)

If Management 2 is just accounting, I reckon I could pick that. Any other subjects that would be easy to score marks in?

shay_562

For choosing 2nd year subjects for BESS which would be the 'easiest' to get Schols in. I'm sure I want to do Single Honours Economics so I've got 3 picked on the basis of that. Maths and Stats, Econ of Ireland and Inter.Econ.

Please don't say 'Pick what you like the most.' I'm set on Single Honours Econ so the rest I'm picking based on Schol maxing. Is Econ of Public Policy easy?

I'm not too good in the essay writing department, so anything that's done on a simple right or wrong answer system is what I'm looking for. Anything subjective would just slow me down.

If Management 2 is just accounting, I reckon I could pick that. Any other subjects that would be easy to score marks in?

While there is something to be said for picking things that you have a genuine interest in (in that it makes it easier to study, and thus maximises your chances of doing well. Having said that, if you did LC Accounting and didn't do terribly, Management 2 is the way to go - if memory serves, the schol paper in my year was about 60/40 practical questions VS theory-based essays, and with less writing involved in the essays than in other subjects (ie, Economy of Ireland). Plus, Pat McCabe is very generous on the General Paper - he gave us the exact question he planned on using before the exam, basically allowing us to prepare the essay completely. Everyone I know who picked that question on the exam got a first (for a couple of us, it pretty much rescued our exemptions; for another, it rescued Schols itself). If, on the other hand, you didn't do Accounting before college, I'd recommend avoiding Management 2 - you can pick it up relatively easily, but the amount of time you need to dedicate to learning an entirely new discipline is disproportionate to the academic reward if Schols is your sole focus.

Management 1 is trickier - the essays themselves aren't too intense, but they look for a very thorough knowledge of the course, and a decent level of original thought. It's quite an achievable 2.1 if that's what you're after, but there may be politics subjects that offer an easier first - one of the people who actually did them can likely help there. And if you're doing French this year, that's a relatively easy paper - you can get a 2.1 in that with literally 3 hours of study the day before, so I'm assuming a first is quite doable.

Good luck! (and the same sentiment naturally applies to all those doing it this year)

Randomness

shay_562 wrote: »

While there is something to be said for picking things that you have a genuine interest in (in that it makes it easier to study, and thus maximises your chances of doing well. Having said that, if you did LC Accounting and didn't do terribly, Management 2 is the way to go - if memory serves, the schol paper in my year was about 60/40 practical questions VS theory-based essays, and with less writing involved in the essays than in other subjects (ie, Economy of Ireland). Plus, Pat McCabe is very generous on the General Paper - he gave us the exact question he planned on using before the exam, basically allowing us to prepare the essay completely. Everyone I know who picked that question on the exam got a first (for a couple of us, it pretty much rescued our exemptions; for another, it rescued Schols itself). If, on the other hand, you didn't do Accounting before college, I'd recommend avoiding Management 2 - you can pick it up relatively easily, but the amount of time you need to dedicate to learning an entirely new discipline is disproportionate to the academic reward if Schols is your sole focus.

Management 1 is trickier - the essays themselves aren't too intense, but they look for a very thorough knowledge of the course, and a decent level of original thought. It's quite an achievable 2.1 if that's what you're after, but there may be politics subjects that offer an easier first - one of the people who actually did them can likely help there. And if you're doing French this year, that's a relatively easy paper - you can get a 2.1 in that with literally 3 hours of study the day before, so I'm assuming a first is quite doable.

Good luck! (and the same sentiment naturally applies to all those doing it this year)

oooo interesting, if i end up picking the subjects i think i will for sf bess:

management 1 & 2
maths & stats
history pol. thought
western european pol
french

then i may be in with a good shot for attempting schols (yay)

but there is also a bridge and something to do with water and a long time between here and there!! good to know though!

paperclip

Is it normal for your body to physically reject study??

ApeXaviour

Yeah. You need to build up an endurance/strength for it.

Get plenty of sleep, water, take fish oil and vits. Snack on nuts etc. not sugary things (sugar crashing leads to terrible attention span and releases cortisol, a hormone not conducive to learning).

paperclip

I've been doing fine all year up until now! Darn it...

sully-gormo

what fish oil and vits would be recommended? All those sweets might explain my short attention span....

ApeXaviour

sully-gormo wrote: »

what fish oil and vits would be recommended? All those sweets might explain my short attention span....

Personally I'd recommend this:

That's what I take, one tablespoon per day. It's a pretty neutral flavour, if it's fishy then it's gone bad.
That's pharmaceutical grade though. If you're going to buy capsules in ireland then they'll likely be healthfood grade i.e. still have some mercury and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) in them. So no more than 5-6 a day. Just look for ones with the highest % of EPA and DHA in them, and balance them with price. Keep them refridgerated.

Vits aren't as necessary, especially if you eat plenty of veggies and fruit. But they won't hurt. Anything multi-vits and minerials, they're all about the same really so just get the cheap ones. Try take them with say some fruit/veg, and something fatty/oily (for the fat soluble vits).

In terms of caffeine, it's fine in "frequent moderation". i.e. a triple espresso will do you more harm than good. There's a whole subculture of people who keep themselves optimally wired. Cutting caffeine tablets into 4 and taking them every 45 mins or something. I usually just go with drinking gunpowder green tea all the time, it has a small amount of caffeine in it, and also keeps you hydrated.

paperclip

In full swing.

How are they going for the rest of ye?

Word to the wise: Don't do rheology, unless you're damn sure you know ALL the equations.

balzarywex

Biochemistry was suprisingly not horrible - thank jebus for enzymology! 2S1 tomorrow however...

Anyone else? Anyone? No really, I need a distraction from double/triple integrals...

paperclip

what came up for you in biochem?

Thirdfox

Con 1 law wasn't too bad at all - good luck to all the law students!

Podge_irl

Is the exam hall still god damn freezing? I lost feeling in my hands several times back when I was doing schols.

paperclip

Podge_irl wrote: »

Is the exam hall still god damn freezing? I lost feeling in my hands several times back when I was doing schols.

Coat and gloves.

balzarywex

Went with ATP synthesis, amino acid metabolism's contribution to gluconeogenesis and 'the behaviour of enzymes in chemistry is catalysed by big molecules- discuss' myself. Other options were parallels between glycogen storage and utilisation, pyruvate as a central molecule in metabolic systems and cellular protein transport. Nice broad paper and probably the one I expected to be toughest as well.

Exam Hall - freezing cold AND sun shining in your eyes. Ill be the one who shows up with both sunglasses and gloves 'n' scarf tomorrow!

Thirdfox

paperclip wrote: »

Coat and gloves.

Not allowed to wear a coat according to the inspectors/official personnel there.

But no, I didn't find it cold at all.

Randomness

slight diversion, but why no scarves allowed in exams?

i would have thought that given the invigelators walk past fairly frequently you couldn't cheat by having something in your scarf?

then again i've never cheated so the world of cheating methods probably is lost on me.

Awayindahils

Thirdfox wrote: »

Not allowed to wear a coat according to the inspectors/official personnel there.

But no, I didn't find it cold at all.

Was talking to a couple of people today and it seemed to be largely down to where you were sitting with whether or not it is cold. As in being near the door and as such suffering the gusts of wind that come in every time its opened.

Thirdfox

Awayindahils wrote: »

Was talking to a couple of people today and it seemed to be largely down to where you were sitting with whether or not it is cold. As in being near the door and as such suffering the gusts of wind that come in every time its opened.

I was sitting near the back (about 3 rows) and a bit to the left - but no one opened the door when we were sitting exams on the 11th so maybe that's the difference.

Zoodlebop

Going nicely for me Phy 1 was delightful, Phy 2, not so much, except the bird question in Section D, which was gas!

2S1 today was tricky, but very doable. Any thoughts?

Podge_irl

The section D questions on Phy 2 are always quite entertaining (though tend to be of the "easy if you know how" variety).

paperclip

pharmaceutical chemistry tomorrow....I'm keeping my fingers crossed for very, very specific topics to come up!!
Well...the main thing to remember here is we have nothing to lose. I know now that even if I have to do the summer exams, I know what I need to focus on. That alone made it worth it for me so far.