Personal Narrative: My Time Away After Graduating Rider

Returning to college, after graduating high school twenty-five years earlier, proved to be not only rewarding quite challenging as well. Viewing myself as a self-starter with extensive investigative skills I truly believed college path mapped out correctly, so I never met with an advisor, what a colossal mistake! I had self-scheduled all my courses and although I faced a few obstacles I was finally at the end. After completion of all my pre-requisites I applied to the LPN-RN Fast Track Program, little did I know my past would stop me dead in my tracks.

One of the proudest accomplishments of my life was receiving my bachelor’s degree from the University of Central Florida. As I approached the stage, I put one foot in front of the other and tried my hardest not to stumble. The crowd roared loudly, I could see Knightro dancing in the corner, it was my turn. In the three seconds that I walked across the stage, I felt a plethora of emotion but most of all… I felt fear because on the other side of the platform was the rest of my life. Unfortunately, my “life after graduation” plan was short-lived, as I found it very difficult to find employment within the first three months of graduating.

Since the start of the semster I have learned many different things about myself and how I can become a better student all around. Summer classes can fly by fast and doesn’t feel like a real semester. That it is just to get credit and move on to the next semester. That was not the case for me this summer semester because I needed to think about the rest of my college career. This summer semester is my first one coming back from academic suspension and I took last semester at South Plains College and Tarrant County College. I did really well making a 3.00 GPA overall and am most likely going to make a 3.5 this semester. This will be a huge boost to my overall GPA. The point is am at the point where I am ready to graduate and will try my hardest to get the best grades I can. I really just changed my mindset towards college and the way I prepare for tests and studying.

I have defiantly not had a normal or a comfortable life. I have lived in RVs and cars on the streets of NE Portland, been homeless twice and I have left the country on multiple occasions cause of my family financial situation. As recent as two years ago I was in Central America and Southern Mexico looking for a safe and decent place to survive in. I missed a year of school. Currently, I live in a leaky, moldy, single-wide trailer home in Rockwood Neighborhood in Gresham. My parents are divorced; my dad, who I live with, is unemployed, has health issues, and has no formal education. So I provide for him and myself.

When we came back from spring break i was on the baseball team this is a big surprise because surprise because i am bad at the game. When our first practice came around we were talking about fundamentals of the game. When i was listening i was confused because he wasn't making sense nor was he giving us the right information. One example is when you dip you shoulder and hit a pop up you dip your back shoulder and he said you dip your front shoulder.

After graduating high school, I went straight into the work field for 2 and a half years. I never really appreciated school growing up and never gave a real effort in grade school. After 2 Years of not going to school, I began to notice and appreciate the value of receiving an education. At first i was hesitant of returning back to school because of my age, I was 21 years old. Most people my age were finishing college and I was just beginning. When I first attended NOVA my goal was to just receive my associates degree in business administration but after a year I realized that I shouldn't just settle for that when I could get my bachelors. I finished my last course at NOVA this past summer and it was a great feeling. I had always planned to

I enjoyed school the whole way through. Senior year I moved to the bay area with my dad, and attended San leandro High where I worked as a kindergarten teacher's assistant as well as walked to two jobs as a CSR at Marshalls and a Sales specialist at Mikasa. My mom passed away of cancer at age 42, when I was 20, and I dedicated some time to my siblings. Two years later I started/ continued on my personal pursuits again as a student, mother and employee. I volunteered at the American River College Child Care facility, and did my training with head start before deciding to take a position developing under privileged preschools for almost five years. And being My daughter's preschool teacher for all of her preschool years. I finished my ECE and AA degrees, and pursued my goals further choosing, applying and attending Union Institute and University since March, Winter session 2

Throughout the active school year, I take part in cross country, track and basketball. I also played volleyball for a year, but I decided to concentrate on my main passion, cross country, instead of dividing my time and attention into two sports at the same time. I have been running cross country ever since I was old enough to run in the munchkin races. The sport has been passed down through the family, almost every single one of my siblings have run or at least tried it. In track, I have ran the mile and two mile since the seventh grade. These last couple years I joined into the long distance relays. In 2016, the first year we decided to start a relay it consisted of my sister, Victoria, Tristen Ness, and Sammy Swanson. The first time we ran

Returning to college has been a prodigious challenge. One in which I determined I would meet head on with resolution. As a fine arts student I was fortunate to find a mentor in the Paradise Valley Community College Theater Director, Andrea Robertson. Andrea perceived potential in me and encouraged pursuit my goals as a writer/director. I took the initiative to approach Andrea with the idea to write and direct my own play in the Advanced Directing course. This past fall that idea came into fruition. As a director I oversaw numerous different areas in the production of my play. These were roles filled by fellow students, allowing the opportunity to provide guidance and leadership to peers. I worked with actors, stage management, set design, prop

It was October 2016 of my junior year, right in the heart of the Cross Country season. Cross Country was fun and team was doing great, but I was looking forward to the upcoming winter track season. High jump is where it is at and that is where I wanted to be and then it happened… I went down and my ankle was caught underneath me and twisted. I'm not exactly sure how it happened, but I was hurt. I was on the ground, in pain as other racers passed me. I was able to get to the finish it wasn’t pretty, it wasn’t fast, but I did it.

"From distance even bumpy roads look smooth". Every year people like me, right now, dedicate hours and a lot of effort in applying to college. But the thing is that I never understood why so much dedication? I have never taught what I wanted to do with my life after High school. Obviously, I knew people graduated from High school, but I just was focusing on the freedom after it not the part of going back to study. I never felt pressure to give my best for the future.Two years ago I moved to the U.S from Puerto Rico to Boston, Massachusetts. One day after my work I was on the train and it stops in front of one of Boston College and I could hear the student talking about a project, I heard one of them saying "Even though I may not like right now this

Our life experience can never fully prepare us for the uncertainty of our future. My years of employment have aided me in understanding the value in working hard. Moreover, the challenges of frequent moves and deployments furnish me the ability to overcome obstacles. The difficulty I face after a long break from academics will be to relearn the basics. I will need to dedicate time daily to studying my current courses as well as prepare for future classes. While I commit myself to my education I feel trepidation about my ability to balance my life.

I first started running Cross Country in 7th grade. I had never run before, so I was on the low end of the team in terms of speed. I got faster as I ran, and could run longer as I increased my endurance. Soon the races commenced.

When I was in middle school, all I could think about was college. I fantasized about going to my dream school, going away really far and being all on my own. At first I thought it would be terrifying, but after a while I soon began to think that it would be extraordinary, living a new life in a new city. My expectations about college would increase every time I thought about it. At the time, I recall that I wanted to attend New York University, to study child development so I can become a pre-school teacher. I enjoyed children very much and thought that, that would be my life after high school. But after a few years, my mindset about college altered. I no longer thought about going to NYU because I expected it to be a very challenging life

My situation is extremely bad with my debt steadily increasing every single month and is impossible to get out of with my income. My main expenses are miscellaneous, mortgage, utilities, and education. Due to my profession and number of kids, it is impossible to change the education expenses and miscellaneous expenses. Those two expenses alone leave me with only $203.45 per month to pay for life insurance, utilities, car loans and the rent. Since I am living with Whitney, the minimum price of an apartment we can buy is 1/6 of our net incomes or $659.54. Even if we split the payments based off of our number of children (I pay for 2/5 and he pays for 3/5 since he has 2 kids) that still makes my rent payment $263.82 - which already puts me over