I just got back from a “graduation” party. A graduate student was celebrating her thesis defence - basically the last step in getting a pHd. While I am happy for her, I’ve been fighting a lot of envy.
This student is my age (29) and her parents paid for her education.
I’ve been working in research for 5 years, I started out as an animal care technician and work my way up to Lab Assistant. My current position required a BS but I got the job because I go to school part-time. I have trained people fresh out of college knowing that they will get a higher salary for the same work I do. I have sat thru classes that were useless and cruel (Organic Chemistry, etc). I work for the university I attend, but I have to get financial aid to pay for my classes. I fight with the financial aid office because my grades are low, but my grades are low because to do real research which takes a lot of my time. Right now I’m thinking about quitting school because I tired of fighting and the dipolma doesn’t guarentee better pay or a better job. :mad:
Sigh I’m just jealous of a grad student with good looks and a supportive family.
I’m not sure I’ll ever get my bachelors. I’m already behind due to crap grades freshman year (laziness) and getting booted out of the very competitive journalism program. I had to take this year to get my grades up (straight A’s last semester) but I don’t know if I will be able to register for the preliminary journalism courses for the fall because my GPA might need another semester. Poo registration being in March. If it were right after spring grades are final, I’d be fine, because I am taking four decently easy courses, will be able to get at least all B’s if not better. And if I ever do get back into the school of journalism, you can only take 10 hours in that area at a time so I will be taking tons of electives with freshmen. Another boo. I just want to take pictures, damnit.
I’m trying to get into the Credential program at San Jose State, but sigh because of my GPA, I very likely might not even qualify for the program, and nobody has given me a straight answer as to if I could simply take a semester of post-bac classes to pad my GPA. Even if I could, it would chew up several months, and prevent me from working as a student teacher this Summer/Fall, where I could possibly get assigned to work in a school that I’m already substitute teaching in. (maybe even a school I used to attend!).
I’m kind of wishy-washy about the whole thing, because the prospect seems so iffy in the first place, and the only reason my job/living situation is in its current state is because it is useful experience toward getting a credential/becoming a teacher without being up to my eyeballs in debt.