CLUEHQ

I’m thrilled.

My Field of Study application has been approved which means that when I am awarded the ALB, I’ll have a Computer Science “field of study” noted on my transcripts. Yay! Also, one of my previous professors has agreed to provide support to my effort to complete a Bachelor’s thesis (called a Reading and Research project). This is all good news.

One of the weird things about HES (and Harvard in general) is that undergraduate degrees don’t have majors per se, but concentrations. Harvard College has a long list of undergraduate concentrations:

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May the Harvard Force be With You!

I actually understood some of that without looking at the subtitles.  How nerdy is that?

As you might guess, there is a bit of confusion regarding the degree programs from the Harvard Extension School. I was in my first semester at HES when the following article was printed in the New York Times:

Harvard, for Less: Extension Courses’ New Allure

One of my professors was interviewed for the article. His impression was that the reporter was trying to get him to admit that the program wasn’t as rigorous as the regular Harvard College classes.

For instance:

At Harvard, although extension students must maintain a C average and fulfill language, science and math requirements, they may deal with the perception that they are not full-fledged Harvard citizens.”Some people are like, ‘What are you exactly?’ ” Ms. Shortill said. “But some people are like, ‘Oh my goodness, you can do that? Wow, that was really smart of you to figure that out.’ “

It’s a topic that is endlessly discussed on various college websites whenever the school is mentioned.

I’m going to list a few reasons why I think that you can make a strong case that the degree you earn from Harvard Extension is comparable in many respects to the degrees you earn from the other undergraduate and graduate schools at Harvard.

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Just in case you were wondering if getting a degree would improve your job prospects:

Man in Yellow Dog Mascot Suit

I’m not trying to pick on the guy but that couldn’t have been his first career choice.

One suggestion that I received from another student when I told them of my plan to take classes online was to investigate a product called 2xAV by Enounce.

In simple terms, what it does is speed up the playback of video streamed over the Internet. I was skeptical at first but the instant I used this product on a real class I knew I was hooked. It was the best $29.95 I spent. Videos can be played back at significantly faster rates with no loss of intelligibility.

To give you an idea of how valuable this feature is, consider that many classes offered at Harvard Extension are streamed via RealPlayer over a broadband connection and last around 2 hours per class. Each video section is about an hour long.

With 2xAV, I can regularly speed up my videos 1.5 times normal rate and watch those videos in 40 minutes. That’s about 80 minutes versus 120. For some classes where the professor has a particular slow style of speech, I’ve been able to speed up the video two times normal speed! That’s an extra hour!

The best part of this is that you find yourself actually getting more out of the videos because all of the distracting pauses are eliminated. You can’t drift off because the pace of the lecture keeps you engaged.

If you plan to do a significant amount of your coursework over the Internet, you owe it to yourself to investigate this tool. It works on Real and Windows Media codecs (but they are two separate products) and doesn’t require you to download the video to speed it up. It’ll work on streamed video.

If I’m honest, I wish the program (which is a plugin for your media players) was more robust. I encountered some minor problems the first time I installed it but was able to get it working in short order.

I also wish that they developed support for Flash video players. Harvard is experimenting with Flash-based streaming of videos and that doesn’t work with this tool. Unless they drop Real entirely, I’ll probably stick with the provided Real streams. I find that they look better at the higher bitrates and the usefulness of this tool is too much to ignore for some minor Flash convenience.

If you’re constantly looking for a way to cut down the time required to get through the lectures, you owe it to yourself to investigate this tool. I give it my endorsement.

2xAV Plug-in
Enounce

A recent submission on Reddit asked if it was better to quit a job to attend a top 20 CS program or to keep the job and commute part-time to a local school that’s ranked 60th or 70th.

First, setting aside all of my misgivings about how poorly the common school rankings fail to measure the suitability of a particular program for anyone, if you’re already employed in the field of IT or in a technology position, it’s my opinion that leaving a paying job that you enjoy to take up an undergraduate or graduate course of study is a mistake, no matter what the school. Your situation might differ, but once you’re in the field, the name on your diploma begins to matter less and less. The common refrain is that your school pedigree is only important in landing that first job. I have to say that my experience mirrors this sentiment.

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It’s finals season for Harvard.

Examinations for Harvard Extension run through Jan. 8–10 and Jan. 14–19. When everyone else is enjoying the holiday season, HES students are worrying about finals.

One of the tough parts about being a distance student is that you have to find your own proctors. I have been using a guidance counselor that is attached to the adult education section of the public school system where I live but I recently found out that one of my finals is scheduled for a Saturday. I’m pretty sure she’s not going to be available which means I have to find someone else who can be a proctor.

I’m pretty sure that I can line up a proctor for the exam. If I don’t, it means I’m going to have to travel up to Boston to sit for it. That would be expensive but do-able. The biggest concern is the time and hassle of traveling. Final exams are stressful enough without having to add travel stress on top of it. Travel for me means flying which is no picnic these days. Even though it’s only a one-hour flight, the time and effort of getting to the airport can really put you into a sour mood.

I had to do this one time before when it turned out that I was going to have to work in the Boston area during the time when my exam was scheduled. Since I live in the DC area, if I can find a proctor I don’t have to visit campus to take tests. If I lived in the 6-state area called New England, attendance in-person is mandatory.

All things being equal, I prefer using a proctor. It’s less stress on me. I make an appointment for the exam and I have the room all to myself.

I’ll let you know how the weekend exam goes.