Personal Narrative: Why I Chose To Attend College

My decision to go back to school in the fall of 2012 was one of the hardest decisions I have ever made. I’m a stay at home mom of 4 boys with 2 of them being special needs. My oldest was born with a rare genetic condition called hereditary spastic paraplegia and my youngest son was born with a rare condition called Dravet Syndrome that requires 24/7 care. I was at a point in my life where I had lost my identity of who I was and I wanted to be me again. I made that important decision to go back to school for myself with the fear of how I was going to do it, but I knew that it was right. It took me 3 years to complete my AS but with the support of my husband and kids I was able to receive my degree. I worked hard and was able to juggle being

My decision to attend Trinity Valley Community College was influenced by two primary objectives. One was to conserve funds, as this is one of the most useful features of community colleges. The second objective was to maintain a 4.0 GPA. This is where I failed.

There might be a time where people ask you, “why are you in college” or “why to decide to go to college.” People might reply by saying that they want a degree, that they want a higher paying job, or they need that for a future career that they are pursuing. Those responses are the most typical reason of why people go to college. Sure you can say that having a degree means that a person can get a better job with better pay rather than working in the manual labor fields with minimum pay. A college degree is the fundamental stepping stone to the future, it lays the foundation of where to start. College is everything to me; I’m in college so I’m able to unlock more potential in myself, to be able to make my mother proud with everything that she has done and hopefully becoming the first.

I always believed that things would just work out in the end. That I did not need to be wrapped up in over complicated situations because they would unravel themselves. I had this idea that I would grow up, go to college, and then get a job. My older brother Joseph had a similar idea. He started at the University of Dayton in August of 2015, but decided to come back home to our house in Bucks County at the end of October in 2015. His simple decision of “college wasn’t for me” had single handedly ripped me from my cozy reality that “everything works out” and had pitted my family against one another.

Noted authors, Brandon Chambers, is quoted saying, “If you are going to fear anything fear success. Think about what you are doing and when you succeed what life you will have.” There are several different reasons why I could stay home, work and not go to college; I could go to work every day and make more money for the house, it’s easier, and I would be less stressed. Now, on the other hand there are many reasons why I should go to school; such as further my education, make my family proud, and make myself proud. I am attending college for several different reasons. One reason is to further my education. I hate feeling like I don’t know something, I like being the person everyone comes to for information. Also, because I want to

I have been in avid since my freshman year of high school and I can honestly say it has really changed my view of college.My freshman year of high school I wasn't even sure I wanted to go to college being that no one in my family went to college I was slightly discouraged.Through avid I learned about college and how it could really change my future.Avid helped me learn organizational skills and study skills that I didnt have before.We learned about taking cornell notes and using our binders as part of our organizational techniques.By becoming more organized I was able to see my grades drastically improve as well.Another concept AVID introduced was the use of planners of course before hand I knew what a planner was but I never really thought

Now that you understand what a typical day looks like for me in college, let me explain to you why certain people in my life would say that I don't have a life because I attend college to better myself .The reason people say I do not have an interesting life because I am currently enrolled in community college,but my response to their hurtful rhetoric ,is that they do not see the underlying reason on why I am attend college.The reason I decided to go to college to expand my mind more and explore new horizons and be able to learn form the best in best in my career field and apply it to my future career.If I did not attend the college I would not be able to expand my mind and expand and be able to break into my career field in the future.

In this world there are those who wish they could be a child again to not have to deal with stress, and then there are those like me. I am fine with who I have grown up to be along with the fact that I am choosing to pursue my dream so late in life. When I was a child I had no idea where my next meal was going to come from, let alone have idol time to think about what might become of myself in the future. Growing up with a constantly drunk mother, no father, a younger sister who was forever breaking the law, your life becomes a moment to moment decision of what needs to be done at that exact moment in time. No daydreaming for this child.

Everyone always told me, “You need to go to college,” but I was thinking about it in an entirely different way than they were. I thought college was needed to get a degree and a good paying job, which is actually true, but college is also needed because it teaches so much more than what can be learn in class. It teaches life lessons, it forces me to become more independent, and provides me with a great experience that I can take with me whenever I leave college and go out into the real world. The key to surviving freshman year is by taking advantage of all these things that will help me grow as a person.

Why do you want to go to college? Is a great question, but one, unfortunately, that I did not ask myself sooner, after high school and my mandatory military service I asked myself: WHERE do you want to go to college? And I answered myself, the best of course. And so I signed up to Tel Aviv University a short 1 hour commute away. After spending a semester in classes that did not interest me. Professors that I found lacking. I found myself thinking, what did I do? Is this right for me? And most importantly why am I doing this to myself? Why do I want to go to college? After thinking long and hard I finally had my eureka moment. I did not want to go to college, I wanted college to come to me. I wanted to be able to study at my pace, with students

I chose to attend Xavier University, quite honestly, because Xavier offered to pay my way through school. The full-ride offer and being rejected by my top-choice university was what landed me at Xavier. I honestly thought that Xavier was one of the last places that I'd end up; nonetheless, I accepted it as my next school and was eager to get work on furthering my education. Once I realized that I would not be able to go to my top school, University of California at Berkeley, I realized that Xavier was going to be my stepping stone. My mentality was and still is that if I stay focused, work hard, and handle my business, that I will be able to get into Berkeley. I don't look at my position in a negative light at all; I've made relationships with

The reason why I want to be in college is that I long for more job opportunities in future. A college education is my objective. Nowadays, more and more companies want to get highly educated employees. So being in University gives me a golden chance to find good jobs, make more money and improve the quality of life. As far as I’m concerned, I should develop myself in many aspects but not in one aspect.

The high school I attended in Hawaii was largely underfunded and did not have the materials necessary to help prepare me for college. In fact, my old high school holds a college readiness index score of 8.7 out of 100 on US News & World Report. Once I recognized that I was in a poor learning environment, I seized an opportunity to transfer from Konawaena High School to Garfield High School (Seattle) in order to better position myself for college. Subsequent to transferring, I enrolled in Running Start courses at Seattle Central College and sought out help to plot my next steps. In addition to applying to several Colleges I was compelled to apply for scholarships, which paid off because I am now a recipient of the Gates Millennium Scholarship.

From the young age of twelve, I’ve watched my three older siblings leave for college one by one. First my sister, Kassie, moved to La Crosse, Wisconsin and attended the University of Wisconsin La Crosse. A year later my brother, B.J., moved to Des Moines, Iowa and attended DMACC. A few years later, my other sister, Heather, moved to Dubuque, Iowa and attended the University of Dubuque for one semester then transferred to the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls, Iowa. All of my siblings went to college, and I would follow suit and also attend college.

Why VCU? Why choose this university out of all the other colleges? At first, I’ve never thought I would go to college out of state so, when applying to colleges my main choices were colleges in-state. They were affordable, close, and everything I had was back at home. Learning about and applying, to VCU was just a suggestion from a friend and a last-minute decision. But I noticed something when touring each school, the majority of the time I didn’t feel that euphoric feeling of “I’m going to college,” instead, it made me feel dreary. But, the last school I decided to tour was VCU and coming here had a different vibe. It made me feel accepted and able to move forward in life with one of the main reasons being the interactions I had with some