Why does a person return to college?
The defining moment for most of the students I attend college with is ‘911′. A non-traditional student will silently chuckle to him or herself as professors say time after time, “I know most of you were not alive when this happened….”. They could be referring to the explosion of the space challenger in 1986, moon walk in 1968, the S&L Crisis or the oil crisis of the early 1970s, or the assassinations of JFK, RFK and MLK; the JFK, RFK, and MLK assassinations were sadly the defining moments of my generation.
I have a point. I may go around my left elbow 6 times to get there. Bear with me. ‘911′ was also a defining moment in my life.
I will always consider my father a silent victim of ‘911′. A WW2 Veteran, he lay in a interim nursing facility watching the world trade centers collapse on TV and then he announced to his nurse that he would not be going to dialysis anymore and he meant it; he passed away 8 days later.
He was always ragging on me to do something for myself instead of always placing others ahead of myself. I kept remembering that and it played a part in my decision to return to college. You see Daddy had a 5th grade education and worked in construction most of his life; he was unable to pay for his three daughters to go to college and unwilling to fill out educational loan papers. He was willing to sign papers for me to enter the Woman’s Army Corp when I was 18 so that I would have the GI Bill. He knew how much I wanted to further my education. Many times a young person makes a choice that negatively impacts their life for decades but this was a choice with positive reverberations for me. I wear my Woman’s Army Corp ring always to remind me how one decision changed my life.
In April of 2007, when I was inducted in the honor society for non-traditional students called OMICRON PSI here at ASU, I said “Daddy, I hope you are looking! I am doing something for myself.”
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- My keys were not in hand
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- Life, Loss, and Love
- A scholarship can be so meaningful.
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- Why does a person return to college?
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- Oh where oh where has my 'Motivation' gone?
- Textbooks can be intimidating!
