Thomas Edison State College

One change that has happened since my last post in August is that I transferred from Stephen F. Austin to Thomas Edison State College. I mentioned this in a previous post, but I had no idea how it was going to work then. Luckily, I only had to complete 19 hours of electives to be finished with my degree! The semester seemed like an uphill battle though because I had a lot of work to do in order to get those 19 hours.

I am proud to say now that I am FINISHED! Well, at least on my end. All the paperwork has to be approved for me to get my diploma in March, plus my "mentors" have yet to grade my work. I am praying hard that everything works itself out.

Overall I am happy with my decision to transfer to an online school. Like anything there are pros and cons.

PROS:
-I was able to finish my degree sooner which allowed me to avoid so many student loans I would have incurred.

-From my point of view the students are much more mature. I have taken online classes through SFA and the students there felt like they could speak to the instructor however they wanted because they weren't face-to-face. Thomas Edison's students were there because they wanted to learn...probably because they are older.

-Online classes force you to read the textbook, so I think I learned a lot more in these classes than I have in face-to-face ones.

CONS:
- I do not get a graduation ceremony. All of my college career I have looked forward to the day I would walk across that stage, so I am sad about that.

-I do not like to write! All of the work consisted of reading and writing. Boring.

-I missed the interaction between my classmates and professors. I felt that very little experience on the instructors part was incorporated into the class.

Now that I am basically a college graduate, I look forward to just working and coming home to my husband, not schoolwork. After I get my diploma I plan to start a program so I can earn a teaching certificate.

In summary...Thomas Edison State College is the real reason I haven't blogged and I am glad I transferred because I.am.finished...basically.

School is Mean+Summer Dreams

I'm getting so close. I have less than 30 hours of school left until I graduate! Right now though, I am stuck. (or I at least feel that way) I took all of my core classes as soon as I could (stupid idea) and now all I have left are communication courses. That's good in a way because I hate math. It is mostly bad though because due to the lack of teachers, most of the classes I need are only offered once and are all at the same time. None of the classes are 8am. I was told that I am a "untraditional" student and "traditional" students don't like 8am classes so they were trying not to offer those as much. Work is important, so this means I now have to go to school part time. Which only lengthens the time I am working on this dang degree. And therefore delays when I can go back to school to get certified in education.

All of this frustrates me so much! I know what I want to do (teach the little ones) and because I didn't come to that conclusion a couple of years ago, I am forced to go what feels like around the world just to get a certification that I could have worked for during these last four years I've been in college. Again, I feel stuck

So this semester is wrapping up. Last Thursday was Horrible Thursday (class registration), tomorrow is Tired Thursday (end-of-the-semester school work), and next Thursday is Celebration Thursday (spring semester is officially over!!).

Although I don't like looking forward to the Fall semester and all that is involved in making sense of the jumble of classes I've taken so far...I am looking forward to the summer! (who doesn't though)

Summer Goals....

Justin and I both thought that it would be best that I learn braille in the near future. Mainly so I can share the job of labeling kitchen appliances and pantry items. I will also be able to type notes to Justin if I need to. Plus I think it will be fun to learn something new, and it will give me the chance to see some of what Justin goes through on a daily basis. I'm either going to take a class at SFA during Summer I (if time and money allows) or the master himself will teach me! (uh, you know I meant Justin right?) I'm not sure how this is going to go because it seems rather confusing now. I'm really not sure if I'll ever be able to read braille by touch. Either way, I will dust off Justin's braille typewriter and start with sentences like, "The cat sat. The fat cat sat. The fat cat sat on the mat." At the end of the summer I will be the braille queen!!

Last Friday I bought a beginner Pilates DVD. Yeah, that intermediate one I started out on was tough. So hopefully I'll make a habit of doing pilates....by the end of the summer I will be ready to run marathons in my head!

I am planning on reading the rest of the Harry Potter series that I started last summer. After the wedding planning went into full gear I had little time to read Harry Potter.

I love watching movies so I to watch lots of movies this summer. Maybe Justin and I can watch a movie a week. Perhaps he would want to watch the Harry Potter movies once I finish a book...maybe??? We'll see.

Maegan and Philip are getting married this summer!! Yay! I will be in their wedding too. :)

I can't wait to have more time to hang out with friends and invite them over to our place.

So even though things might be tough now and tougher this summer....I have all those things to look forward to as well!