How to prioritize and organize learning?

Question

Electronics

I'm in the 10th grade. I want to enter ITMO, but, as I was told, the surest way to get into it is the Olympiad. I realized that I didn’t understand anything (almost nothing) in computer science itself, because in all my four schools they had never done it normally and hadn’t taken the subject seriously.
But here's the problem - I want to create something, implement some kind of project (I'm learning python and c). Just as wildly interesting are robotics with electronics (or can it be written in one area?), Space (rather popular science literature).
I don’t understand at all how I can manage all this, what is better to postpone for later, and what is better to put in the first place. Plus to all this total fear in my choice. I'm afraid to pick up and start studying some bad material, because I'll lose time. I'm always afraid of losing time for nothing because of this, but I lose more time because of thinking about it. Thank you in advance

Answer 1

The most realistic thing is to enter robotics without any Olympiads and all "blah blah blah, you are the chosen one." The university will not let you realize anything, but it will teach you how to learn how to implement projects.
You have to choose what you like best. But the most important thing is not to dream, but to look at things realistically. In other words, nothing will change, you will still study, but you will spend a lot of extra time traveling to the university.
ps I personally wrote computer science for 85 points without preparation, and I made a mistake in the first tasks. In fact, writing is very easy, especially tests.

Answer 2

I solved a similar problem by self-education. Most likely there are some correspondence courses for schoolchildren from a particular university / institute.
It is important to understand the following things:
1. A quality educational institution fights for quality applicants, it is interested in them.
2. The level of high school and the requirements of a quality university are heaven and earth.
3. University requirements for mere mortals, you don't need to be a genius, you just need to be prepared.
3. Free time is your competitive advantage, think about what to spend it on.
I would suggest the following plan:
1. Sign up for correspondence courses at a specific university, so you can bring your level up to the requirements of the university.
2. Understand the specifics of the requirements of the university (take past exam tasks) and study on your own, pull up your level under them - there is a lot of literature.
3. Read a lot, a lot of different things, work on erudition in areas of interest: physics, mathematics, computer science.
4. Mini-projects are a bonus, first you need to complete the mandatory program (p. 1-3). They can be mentioned during the interview (in the questionnaire), they will not affect the entrance exams in any way.
Everything is simple here, if you want to enter a good university, spend 2 years on this task - it is quite doable for any student who wants to study.