I entered SUNY Farmingdale in the Fall of 1975 fresh out of high school as an Automotive Engineering major. I should have been a superior candidate as I took 3 years of mathematics (elementary algebra, geometry, and advanced algebra combined with trigonometry) and science (biology, chemistry, and physics). The first of the Texas Instruments (TI) calculators had come out with trig functions running $300 and my father was not about to lay out the money for it. He said, "The older a technology gets, the cheaper it gets. I'm not paying for it." This is true but I had to use logarithmic tables and a slide rule, when most of my peers were using calculators completing exams at a much faster rate. I was competing for grades against my peers using bear skin rugs and stone knives. My engineering drawings were always filthy and I was loosing points because of the filth. Again, we had all these ancient drafting tools at home that were in dire need of replacement and my father's attitude was "I'm not spending money on that either because when the semester is done, you'll never use the tools again." That was never true as I still use them to this day. When winter came I dressed the same way I did in high school not appropriately for the weather. Many of the classes were a good twenty minute walk across campus and because I was attending a "commuter school," it was always a long hike to class from the back of the parking lot. I got severely sick from not dressing for the weather. My transmission blew up on my car and I didn't have the money to replace it or to replace the car. My father wasn't going to help me with that either. I was loosing a great deal of class time and found myself unable to keep up with the academic workload. I was poorly advised academically also. I was carrying 18 credits each semester instead of dropping some courses and taking them during the summer. I was immature and overwhelmed with problems I was expected to resolve everything myself with a poor student's resources. I was being expected to solve my own problems when I didn't have the problem solving skills. I dropped out in the Spring of 1976 due to psychological stress. My first girlfriend dumped me (she sung this song over and over like a 5-year old, that's why), my parents got a divorce, and my gas station manager put me on for too many hours because he was shorthanded. I had no idea where to turn and took the easy and stupid way out by doing nothing, just flunked out! This was a bad academic choice because when I did return I had to struggle against my cumulative average. As I said, I was "ill housed and ill advised."