This has been one interesting summer for me. I have made progress at my nine-to-five as a supervisor, I have grown even closer to my parents (we are already close, I didn’t think it was possible), and I have learned my strengths.

This summer I was enrolled in summer classes at Trident Tech in Charleston.
I originally was not going to attend summer school, but my sister-in-law and I were talking during my spring break. She asked when I was graduating. I told her May 2016. She asked, “Have you taken summer classes yet?” I told her no. She started to get excited and told me, “You need to if you want to graduate on time.”

She continued by saying, you really cannot complete everything in eight semesters. You have to put in extra time and effort so you don’t have to stay an extra semester. I thought that was quite interesting. The staff at Francis Marion University have made suggestions like, “it would be best to take classes to get ahead,” but they never said take classes to graduate on time. I’m glad I decided to listen to my sister-in-law because I ended up needing to take courses anyway because I was two credits shy of getting my LIFE Scholarship for this fall.

As a transient student at Tech, you cannot get a scholarship from them, so I needed to get a loan. I ended up missing the deadline to get the loan and had to pay over $500 out of pocket. It was then that I learned always ask for the deadline, cutoff date, or purge for things revolving money. Thank goodness all I needed was to take two classes because it was cheaper.

I only took two classes at the technical school at home, and I enjoyed them. American Government taught me things I never knew before and I saw government officials in a new light; I had a new respect for them. The Constitution has not changed, but people interpret the Constitution differently to keep up with the times. I also liked American Government because as a journalist I will be reporting information involving the government, and I want to make sure I know what I’m talking about.

I’m glad I took World Geography because as a journalist I felt as though I needed to know more about cities and countries they might send me to. I now know why certain countries (Russia, Ukraine and Israel) are in the news so much now, because these issues have gone on for decades, even centuries. It also helped that the professor was a man that had to travel to different lands because he worked for oil companies. He brought in his passports and told interesting stories about what he has seen or heard in foreign countries.

Even though I had some issues with my summer school, it was a great experience.  Contrary to some people’s beliefs, going to a technical school does not make you a less intelligent person. We were still opinionated in class, and respected each other’s opinions. The work load was decent; not too much where you felt swamped, but enough to where you needed to keep up or you would fall behind. I’m glad I had informative teachers, and I’m even fonder of the fact that I can now graduate on time from Francis Marion University.