Writing is a touchy subject for me. I sometimes love it, and I sometimes struggle with it. I would say that struggling was the theme for me this term. These struggles come in various forms and they are the result of many outside distractions. At the beginning of the term I felt anxious for several reasons. One, I own a small business, being an owner has it’s ups and downs. It is nice being your own boss, but it also comes with many responsibilities. Constraints that I have come to realize, conflict heavily with the responsibilities that I have to my professors and the classroom. Two, my wife was accepted into the Nursing program, my family now relies solely on me to provide an income. In order to allow her time to study my roles at home have changed as well, such as helping out around the house. This ensures that my wife has less duties around the house. Three, I feel very overwhelmed with the amount of information coming to me. This will be my 10th straight term at LCC and I may be suffering from TMI (too much information), not the “I’ve heard too much about your personal life” TMI, but the “my brain hurts!” TMI.
Business is demanding, especially in my line of work. I am a Home Theater installer, and when someone wants their TV and surround sound setup for the Duck game then I better be there to make sure they can watch it, or I lose that persons business to someone else. It is a dog eat dog world out there, I have a family to provide for and the economy is not great. Thus, I must take advantage of all the jobs that come my way. I have been able to juggle this fairly successfully in the past, but in the past, I have had a business partner to cover operations during the times that I have class. This term has been different however. At the beginning of the term my partner decided to get a part-time job on the side. At the time I did not realize how much extra burden this would put on me. It has been difficult to say the least, not only did I lose the help needed to stay on top of all the work coming our way, but business also significantly increased. This made it very difficult to find time to focus on my projects outside of school.
My wife got into the nursing program! Congratulations to her, it is an incredibly hard task to accomplish and she has many difficult terms ahead of her. In order to support her through this our lives have gone through some significant changes. My office is gone! The workload that the program has given my wife is intense. If she is at home then I will know where to find her, the office. It is great to see her working so hard but because of this, it is often hard for me to find a quiet place and a computer to work at.
TMI! After 10 consecutive terms at Lane Community College I believe that my brain is giving up. I started school with the desire to obtain my ‘Network Operations’ degree. I thought this would be the most logical career path for me. I am already in a career that involves technology, and as home entertainment progress’ it relies more and more on networking. After about eight terms I began to realize that computers may not be my thing, they continually frustrate me, and many people that are successful in this line of work are much more passionate about computers/programming than I. So recently I have decided to declare myself as an AAOT student. I had already taken many courses that were specific to my Networking degree, when I decided to switch my focus I also chose to take on additional classes. This is tough because trying to take specific courses for a degree and work them into a schedule that fits with my busy life has taken its toll. It is why I have been in school for so long now and why I have been taking courses every term with no break. It has already taken some time to get where I am at, because certain classes are only available certain terms I must take advantage of each and every time a class fits into my schedule.
This term I completed most of the assigned projects. I have learned to write blogs and have enjoyed writing papers from an opposite stance. My work has been good, but my timeliness has suffered from the reasons stated above. All-in-all I have thoroughly enjoyed the course. I have made every effort to be in class because I feel this is when your teachings were most successful with me. Your personality is wonderful and your in-class lectures and activities were incredibly helpful and engaging. My work was done, I was present in the classroom, and I was an active participant in all the in-class activities. All that said, I do not feel that I put in one-hundred percent. Therefore I believe I deserve a ‘B’.
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