So this is the end huh?

January 12, 2004. Cold like the ambient weather. Wearing a borrowed jacket, waiting to walk into the Lord Fairfax Community College-Fauquier building the first time, my first college class ever and really first class inside anything like the public school sphere. And thus I sit down in my first day of my first class ever, American History 101 at the ungodly (I thought) time of 9am and with that I thus began a 7.5-year chapter of my life. To say I had no idea what I would be getting into is an understatemtn.

After 2-years of being begged from all I know to do something with my life and get into a class-room so I can better my life I finally did so. It took working a retail job I hated to convince me that if I wanted to do something more with my life than work miserable jobs, then for god's sake Alvious get into a classroom and make something happen! So I get my butt into the placement testing center summer 2003, do what I'd thought had been kind of good and wait for the results.
One of the happiest days of my life had been not long after leaving said miserable retail job I get a letter saying LFCC is happy to announce that I am approved for admission! Wowee! I go to the orientation and get set to register and then take actual classes.

After 7.5 years I Alvie (with an English sounding last name the same of a bird and a soul musician who inspires me), I hath finished a Bachelors degree in the Liberal, as opposed to Conservative, Arts. It has been a trek and I will question whether it had been worth it. Truly, I seriously think it has been, I cannot imagine myself without having gone as far as I have. Who would I be? How would I think? Sure, I'd have liked to have gone sooner, now as I know unlike my 20-year old self that oh wow, and for those reading yet to go to college and worried about difficulty, here's the thing, it's often not that hard! It'll be challenging at times but guess what, that can be good for you. Two classes I had which were both quite difficult I still got reasonable grades for but more importantly I learned a lot! Classes dealing with language can be extremely useful even if you're not set on being a linguistics professor or a translator. If they're taught well they'll help you do something always important in your life, improve your ability to think!

I acquired two degrees from four schools, yes that's four different schools. Two community colleges and two with graduate level accreditation and honestly would love never to take another class at any of them. Well, the community colleges okay as I found them more enjoyable to deal with as a whole.

And to finish this post of all I learned inside the world of higher academia is that there is nothing like getting an education to get an education. There have been extremely few times I felt so dumb or so smart as have been times in academia.

-Finishing sooner is better then prolonging it, however you need to have a real idea of what you want to get and how to get it.

-Making friends in college will keep you sane. I made many friends at LFCC, few at HACC, many at MU and none through Excelsior.

-Get a hold of the reading list as early as possible and buy previous editions used. -You'll not learn less and you'll save a lot. Seriously as I'd gone from spending about 400 a semester on books, which I'd get maybe 100 back tops! if I tried to resell. Sure, you'll be stuck with some unsaleable duds but you will not be out a lot. After learning to buy books the cheaper way, I spent about 150 on books.

-Bs get degrees! even if you get few As and numerous Bs you'll still graduate.

-Those who poo-poo community colleges are idiots, you can get a decent education and really, if the credits are good enough to transfer between other schools, all state and many private, then what's your complaining about? School is not a place to be arrogant over the letterheads on the transcripts, especially when that letterhead is so much more expensive than the others. I have friends who've gone to very expensive private schools and they have no better luck with jobs then those that haven't, but they owe a lot more in student loans then myself and those who went to state school.

-Having a degree plan will save much time and energy and I do recommend that. I knew I'd want an English degree for years and though I waffled on different specializations I stuck with my original idea as I didn't want to start over. Also, if you need a semester or a year off, take it! But do something with yourself during that time, go WOOFing, traveling, anything to clear your mind and think over things so that you'll find yourself and then go back. No one's going to care if you finish in 4-years, 5-years or even 7.5-years, it's important to just finish.

Alvie