by Lorraine Messineo

Created on: December 27, 2008

Recycling Your Research

I was 48 before I realized my dream of attending college. My academic advisor lined up my first semester classes-remedial algebra, English 111, Intro to Biology and Spanish I. I struggled through the semester, wondering if I had made a huge mistake. Aside from my coursework I had a life outside of school that included a job, a home to keep in order, a first grader who needed my attention and the myriad duties of single parenthood. I was exhausted and overwhelmed by the end of the semester. I knew that there had to be a way to do it all, and I had to find it.

My biggest problem was algebra. Numbers never really sparked me, although I had worked as a bookkeeper, data entry, accounting assistant, carpenter and steel fabricator. All of the formulas I was struggling to learn were familiar to me. My problem was not in doing the work but in proving it! I knew all the shortcuts, but when it came to solving the problems I inevitably skipped a step or two in my details of the work. It was a mental block that took me two semesters to overcome.

Having survived the first semester, I worked on unlearning my bad math habits and retraining my brain to include those steps I had previously deemed unnecessary when doing my algebra calculations. Building a mud fence would have been easier for me. I had already had a taste of academic writing and was worried that I would end up either a total failure in college or having some kind of breakdown. I was spending a minimum of 5 hours a day on conquering the problems I had with algebra. I knew that the demands of the first semester were only the tip of the iceberg. How was I going to it?

I lined up my classes for the fall semester then went on line to access the syllabus for each class in the semester that had just ended. Something clicked. There were relationships between the subjects I planned to take, places where they intersected or overlapped. Why couldn't I use those relationships to my advantage?

I knew that I needed a way to organize my research materials so that these relationships could be used to their greatest advantage so I went on line. I found a free bibliography builder and downloaded it. Then I went to the library and accessed its copies of the textbooks I would be buying in the fall. I was certain that the assignments would not be exactly the same for my semester as the ones in the syllabi, but that the information taught would be consistent from semester to semester.

I planned on taking Introduction

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