A Mike Life – The Life of Mike!

Back in school

// January 13th, 2009 // family

I thought I was done with the University of Phoenix when I finished taking my core classes last fall. I had a few credits I needed before I graduated, but they were all electives and lower level stuff. I needed around 16 credits.

The plan was to study for and take these fairly inexpensive CLEP tests. You pick a class, find the material and study, study, then take a test, hope you pass and get the credit. I was all set to graduate in the fall if I killed these tests.

Well…once I was done with classes, I found myself gloriously free from the bonds of school and it was excruciating to think about studying for a test. First off, I’d been at UoP since the beginning of 2006, so it had been over 2 1/2 years that I was doing this. 5 weeks on, 1 week off…for that long. It was painful at times.

Secondly, none of my classes at this school involve test-taking. It’s all papers, presentations and discussions in online forums. So the notion of studying for an exam was no fun at all.

And I kept putting it off…and putting it off. This is a fault of mine that I freely admit to. Procrastination. If I’m not under the gun or being somewhat forced to do something, I usually put it off.

One day Jina said to me, “If you want to just go back and take classes online so you get it done, I think you should do that. I want you to finish.”

It was an interesting idea. First off, it forces me to finish and do the work. Secondly, maybe even a better reason, is that it will postpone my student loan payback for another year. And with Jina cutting back to 20 hours a week, money will be tight for awhile until we get used to how things work.

I’m fairly embarassed to even have to do this. Why can’t I just take the tests? I dunno, but the thought of going to classes definitely seems like the right way to finish, even if it will cost me a bit more money.

So today I start my first class. It’s U.S. History to 1865. I love history, so this will be an interesting learning experience. American history if my favorite.

The only worry I have with these elective classes is that I may actually have to put in more work than I did for my core classes. The reason is that I pretty much knew what those classes were about. Programming, project management, networking, software…I work with that stuff daily, so it didn’t take a ton of effort to do well.

With this history class, a second history class, then two religion classes…I’m definitely going to have to do more reading and more studying.

It will all be worth it though. Come this summer, I will officially graduate and be happier for it.