r/PhysicsStudents

I transferred from community college to state school, and because there were no spots in the normal class left I ended up in the honors physics class. Dawg. Today we spent abt an hour going deriving Planck’s radiation law and Wien’s law and Stefan-Boltzmann, first time I’d seen any of it, and then we got a quiz on it like right after? I didn’t know what to do for half the questions it was so fast.

I don’t talk to a lot of other kids in my class bcos I’m nervous and tbh a lot of them seem way smarter than me, but like, is everyone else getting this and I’m just the dumb one????

With our first exam, I didn’t get to finish two of the ten problems because we only had 55 minutes. All the ones I did I got perfect scores on, but the whole grade dropped bcos of those. Like how is everything moving so fast?

Thank god I genuinely like the work that we do otherwise I’d have switched majors by now. Ugh

I am pursuing a dual degree in math and physics for undergrad and focusing on mathematical physics in grad school (maybe string theory but most certainly particle physics). I am going to begin learning coding languages in advance so that I can do computational physics for necessary simulations. I was wondering what the most important ones would be for this specific focus?

I am/was really interested in physics so I applied to technical physics at tu Vienna we had the first 2 days and we were doing so much and I’m so overwhelmed and I’m so scared I won’t pass anything cause in my Highschool we didn’t do a lot of math. Also Studentenbeihilfe im scared I’ll have to pay its back if I don’t pass. Can someone give me advice on what to do? (Also I moved here just for physics. (I also don’t want it to consume my whole life)

I am planning on staring school in January. My major is physics with an astronomy focus. I am from the US and looking at changing jobs to something that would help support schooling or just something different. I currently work as a nurse with 3 12hr shifts a week amd my advisor said that schedule and this degree are not compatible. I'm just wondering what you guys have done while getting your degrees. I probably will stay a nurse for the first year but just want to be one the look out for something different.

I am currently in my first year and would be taking mathematical physics, mechanics and optics as part of the curriculum. I know python and a few libraries like numpy, matplotlib and pandas. I have a very meagre experience with scikit learn.

I wish to work on computational condensed matter projects, but I don't know what computational tools or books to pick up with. Any guidance on this would be very appreciated.

I am currently referring to kittle for solid state. So far I have only covered a little of crystals and lattice. I would love to join a group/lab during my summer vacation (that is next year, around may 2027).

Hello everybody I came on here for some advice with my uni physics class. So basically I’m like really good at math/calc but when it comes to Physics I have always been horrible. The last time I took a physics course was about 6 years ago as a freshman in highschool during covid and it was virtual and I absolutely sucked at it. Now for my major I have to take University Physics (calculus based physics) and it’s giving me such a hard time. I study SO MUCH and I still can’t seem to fully understand the topics. I thought I had a somewhat okay understanding but got a 66% on my first test. To be fair my professor is the absolute worse. He’s a very nice guy but his teaching style is pretty much non existent. He gives us a packet and gives us VERY vague instruction and then we are expected to just figure it out. I know I’m not crazy because his reviews on Ratemyprofessor pretty much agree with exactly what I’m saying. And yet during class time most people (not all) but most seem to know exactly what to do. I genuinely feel so dumb I’ve never felt this dumb in my life and it’s really affecting me and my confidence. I spend hours studying and watching YouTube videos but it’s still not clicking for me. I know you might say “Go to his office hours!” But I’ve seen him explain things to students who don’t understand the material and he kind of comes off as a “it’s common sense” kind of way iykwim.

If anybody has any suggestions please let me know how I can get better at physics. The way I study has worked for me with every single class except this one. Please help me out guys! Thanks.