[Guardsman]

Hey guys, I want to go to school for engineering, Electrical or Electronics (both, if they have a program like that).

Anyhow, I have a big problem that currently prevents me from finishing even my Associates (Community College of the Air Force).....I can't do text-book algebra.

I can do applied algebra, I've been doing it since I was a kid. But, put a text book in front of me, with x=axb+c2/d, and I might as well be reading Latin.

One test study guide that I looked at had a question asking what the square root of i is. I can't even begin to understand how I get an answer to that. My line of thinking is that an imaginary number doesn't exist, therefore, it can't have a square root. Nothing = nothing.

I worked at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center until recently, and I looked over some of the papers and machine technical stuff, in how the accelerator works, beam physics, etc.

When I look at that kind of stuff, it makes sense to me....I may not know the exact answer, but if I had all of the necessary information, I could figure out the answer.

I also picked up a book, "Engineering Formulas", by two German guys, and looking through there, the formulas make sense to me.

Has anybody had this kind of problem before, or know somebody that did, or just have any suggestions that might help me out?

I love doing math, but it frustrates the crap out of me that I can't get past this. I tried taking algebra twice in high school, flunked both times, tried it again in 1998, and got a D on that.

I don't want to just pass the classes, I actually want to learn the stuff. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

John

[Guardsman]

Miki,
That actually did help....it didn't answer all of the questions (number 5 in the book there doesn't make any sense to me), but I see how the imaginary numbers work now.....That also reminded of something that I've been thinking of trying, to see if it might help....

I remember in school, I if I had a hard time with problems, I would get the answer, including all of the work, and then reverse-engineer, so to speak, and that would help me figure out how to do the problem.

I've been wondering if I might be able to do the same thing with math in general, i.e., start at a very high-level of math, like calc, and then work back from there.

Looking at that one page on that book, it actually makes some sense to me, more than what I seen in algebra books.

I'm going to be trying to test for my math class again (CLEP test for the military), and/or take a class (taking a class if I fail the test), so I'll probably contact you guys on that.

If you don't mind, I'll try and keep this thread going, and start digging up some work, and figure it out on here.

Matt, thanks for that link, I'm also going to check into that.

John