I don't know how some people manage to work full time and go to school full time. It's hard enough for me to work full time and go to school part time, or work part time and go to school full time, let alone doing them both full-time! I work with a woman who has been working full-time and taking 9 graduate credits per quarter. Nine! And she's still sane! I had enough trouble with one 4-credit online econ class this summer along with my full-time job (and moving, of course), and I don't know what I'm going to do when my 5-credit biology class with lab starts up in the fall.
I don't know how they schedule it either. For instance, my biology class has to be in the evenings because I work during the day. It takes up three evenings a week: two for lectures, one for lab. Now, there's also a GIS class I'd love to take; however, it is also offered in the evening, and happens to be the same evenings as biology. Now, what am I supposed to do with that? If I could take biology during the day, I could take the GIS class in the evening, and everything would be hunky-dory. ... Oh, yeah, except for the little problem of work.
I'm starting to really long for a very flexible, part-time work schedule that would let me work around whatever class schedule I happen to have each quarter, and let me take more than one class per term. I would dearly love to not only finish my minimum prerequisites for graduate school, but also get a stronger foundation in some of the areas I'm weak (for instance, statistics, shudder though I do at the thought), in the next year, so that I can apply for graduate school for next fall. But that's not going to happen as long as I'm working 40 hours a week, because I just don't learn if so much of my time and brain power is spent on not-school.
As much as I'm comfortable with my current job and like the people that I'm working with and am getting paid decently with great benefits, I feel like I'm letting myself get stuck there. Okay, so they pay me to ride my bike to work, which is fantastic, but the job itself really isn't doing anything for me, and the longer I stay there, the longer I'm building a really great resume for a career I know I don't want. I'm starting to wonder if it's time to take the risk and get myself unstuck, and put the priority back on my education. Of course, I'm not giving myself much time to make this decision (and find a part-time job) if I want to have any flexibility for the fall quarter.... Can I pause the clock for a while while I figure all of this out, please?
Maybe I've just let myself get too stressed out with everything that's been happening recently, and I'm not thinking clearly. I've made some pretty rash decisions so far in my life, some of which were significant ingredients in the brewing and stewing of my current quandary (would I be facing this dilemma in the first place if I'd stuck with my original major?), and I really don't want to throw away the pretty-darn-good thing I have without being pretty-darn-sure that I'm moving on to something better. But part of me insists that this is thinking clearly, that this is what makes sense to most quickly get me back on the track I need to be to make my life fulfilling.
Money sucks.
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I think Hermione Grainger's time-turner would really be helpful right now. If only! ;-) Perhaps there are some student loans, grants or scholarships out there that could help defray costs enough to allow you to work part time and take more classes. Perhaps your current employer would be willing to flex your work hours or something to allow you to take another class? You're a smart woman and I know you'll figure out how to make it work for you. You'll be in my prayers.
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