greg

Greg


Greg graduated from UNH in September, 2004 with majors in Philosophy and Political Science. Currently attending Texas A&M on a Graduate Assistantship stipend, Greg is pursing his Masters Degree in Philosophy and may pursue a Ph.D. Greg leads recitation sections for Engineering Ethics, a class for aspiring engineers, where he combines his love for teaching, learning, and Philosophy.


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STUDYING IN THE BATCAVE


 TIME MANAGEMENT


GETTING DIAGNOSED WITH ADHD AND A LEARNING DISABILITY


HAVING ADHD


STRATEGIES


BEYOND MEDICATION


FUTURE GOALS


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STUDYING IN THE BATCAVE
I had three other roommates (in my apartment) and so there were a lot of distractions. My working style was inefficient with all the distractions. I needed a place to go that was quiet. I don’t know how it came to me. My closet was about two feet out and I thought my T.V. dinner table could fit in there. I wondered if my desk chair could fit too. So I moved my clothes out, closed the door and stood in there. I thought this is pretty quiet and there is nothing to distract me. So I moved everything out, moved the table it, got the chair in, sat down and slide the door shut. Wow, this works. The next step was to put the laptop in there. I shut the door and that was my study space for the next three and a half months!  My roommates called it the bat cave!



TIME MANAGEMENT
My first year as a Resident Assistant (RA) was a very hard transition.  As an RA, I had to help other people but I also realized I needed to take time for myself.  That was something I hadn’t realized because I had always had an abundance of free time. You know you take time for friends, you take time for residents, you start to realize how precious your time is. I would turn off the phone. I would do odd work hours when no one would be up. In the dorms the most active hours are at night, so if you get up early and do your work, it is quiet. Ideally the way I structure my time now is to do my work in the morning while the majority of students aren’t really up or they are in their classes. I still wrestle with structuring my time, but I know it plays an important role in my success.



GETTING DIAGNOSED WITH ADHD AND A LEARNING DISABILITY
My parents were support. I probably made it by in high school because they stayed on me. But eventually I told them, there was something else going on. I am a pretty bright kid and I just cannot do my homework in a reasonable amount of time. You’ve taken everything away from me; I am just sitting staring at the book. They helped me with the initial step. My physician diagnosed me with Attention Deficit Disorder. He isn’t a psychologist so that wasn’t good enough documentation for the Access Office (in order to get accommodations at UNH). After experiencing that frustration, I went to the psychiatrist and was formally diagnosed. This year for the LSAT and GRE (tests to get into Law School and Graduate School), I needed cognitive testing done to legitimize my disability further. The tests showed I had a learning disability in addition to the ADHD. Showing me the numbers and where the mistakes were I made, I can see it. It affects your potential. You know you have a superior IQ, but your achievement is stunted because of the LD and ADHD which is why you basically bombed certain parts of the test.



HAVING ADHD
 I did a bunch of research when I found out I was ADHD. I knew that there was a lot of skepticism about it. If I was going to be labeled then I really wanted to know what it was. I didn’t want to use it as an excuse. I didn’t want to get lazy. After I was educated on it, I started to watch myself.  There were certain things I could see. I do have hyperactivity. I constantly pace and I can never seem to stand or sit still; I have the urge to be moving. My inattentiveness would impact my test taking.  I would read a question and be thinking about something else. Sometimes I would move on to the next question with the belief that I answered the question before it when I hadn’t.  To compensate, I would move slowly and re-read questions but then I had problems completing the test. So I would get back tests that had blank gaps in it or that was half completed.
 
I went into my junior year with accommodations. The extended time on tests does help. When I am going into a four and a half hour exam due to the extra time, I am working doubly hard to focus. It is exhausting because I am watching myself while I am taking the test. I need to be aware of what I am doing to self-regulate. By the end of the test, I am burned out. That’s when the ADHD is a disability.

I am a philosophy major so most of my work is writing and expressing ideas so in that context, ADHD can be an advantage. It can be very helpful to have all those ideas running through my head!  Maybe not in me finishing the paper exactly on time! It takes me longer. I have all these good ideas and now I have to organize them.  I have to accept that writing a paper is going to take me longer than other students. My friends gave me a joke gift for spending so many hours in the library….a chair that resembles the ones in the library!



STRATEGIES
I am constantly seeking the best way to study. If I am not getting work done at a particular place, I have to cash in my chips and try somewhere else. I also don’t throw it away on a dime either. If I am not doing work, I don’t immediately say it is the study space. I try to force myself to stay there for some time and try to work through the difficulty. I know now when I am burnt out and can’t do it anymore.

 There are a lot of other factors going on. You don’t really know how you are going to be distracted. It is not solely the location. I need to put myself in areas where I can limit my distractions. I need to take breaks. I have to know little distinctions: when to ask someone for help or when to do it myself, knowing the difference between laziness vs. tiredness, inattention vs. unmotivated, knowing when to stay down and push through it because in the end it will be worth it. Getting into the mindset, this doesn’t have to make my life worse. Learning these things helped me move from being a 3.3 student to having a 3.9 or 4.0 average.



BEYOND MEDICATION
For me the college experience was really important. It was something I wanted. If  I do this, I have to want it. I fought for it. There was a lot of time that I invested into it. It was self realization: the ADHD does affect me. It can’t be that my doctor says I have this. It is sad to me when people say, yes my doctor says I have ADHD and I have this medication to fix me, to help me do my homework. There isn’t that battle there. For me, even though I take some medication, I need to do it on my own. A college day is long. Most of these drugs are 6 to 12 hours tops. You can’t just rely on these drugs. I try not to take any after 6:00 pm so I can sleep at night. I study in chunks. I try to set at least 2 to 4 hours for studying when I take my medication. It is a waste to take the medication and then go play whiffle ball with my friends.



FUTURE GOALS
College has been a great experience for me. I had a lot of experiences being an RA, a teaching assistant, and an orientation leader. I would like to do a Ph.D. in Philosophy and/ or a law degree.  I love academics in the sense of researching and writing. So as a professor, I can do both: teach undergraduates giving them a positive experience and professionally write. I will try to keep as many options open to me as possible.

 I applied to 8 well respected graduate programs in Philosophy. I wanted full financial assistance. Of all the schools that had money and accepted me, two Texas schools offered me full financial packages!
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