Forget about working my way thru college -- I had to work my way thru high school. We were very poor when I was young, and I had to go to work full time while finishing my last year of high school just to help keep food on the table (no wonder I feel an affinity for the Depression era.) I worked and applied myself, and resolved to teach myself everything I needed to know to do what I wanted to do. And to this day if a day goes by where I don't learn something, I consider it a day wasted.
So if the University of Hard Knocks gave out advanced degrees, why, I'd be summa cum laude....
I will complete the coursework for my MLS in less than one month (July 12th) and this September I will start a second advanced degree program - an MS in a public policy related field.
I've been schooled in both hard knocks and ivory towers. I attended a snotty prep school via scholarship but also worked after school and had my own pet sitting business. Basically I was the working class kid surrounded by the wealthy elite in NYC. They had limo drivers, I had a buss pass. When I earned may Master's degree I also worked full time and lived in a one room house that the UPS man mistook for a tool shed (he told me after I chased the truck, asking why he kept passing by).
It's spooky how many years one can spend in formal education.
After K-12 schools, I spent 4.5 years in undergraduate school, a few years later I added 3 more getting my master's, and it took 10.5 years from start to finish on my Ph.D. That's another 18 years - of course, all of it after undergrad school was while employed, and I worked through undergrad school as well.
And now that knowledge is turning over so fast (about every 5 years in many professions), everyone basically is engaged in learning throughout life, even if it's just the occasional workshop or training seminar.
Since I'm an administrator in a Continuing Education unit, this is old news to me...but it sure has changed our world.
I'm what they call old school: went out to work at 15, starting in a meatworks where people got killed in union disputes, and over the years had about 60 different occupations from jackhammer guy and pub bouncer to roller skate mechanic by way of passport officer, debt collector, and rock journalist. I went back and got a Degree in Creative Arts at the age of 46...I reckon I taught them more than they taught me, it sits in a drawer..never used it.
Just finished 3rd year of a Law Degree in my spare time. 1 year to go. When that's done I'm going onto Masters. But I spent all of my adult life till now without a degree, and still got where I am. With you LizzieMaine on learning something every day.
Interesting - as of this post, 77% of the respondants have degrees ranging from Associate to Doctorate. That's a good bit higher than the general population.
I graduated with a BA in history in '97, then for the next few years wasn't quite sure what I wanted to do, so I got married and had a baby.
I went back to school in 2002 and graduated with my MA in history from UNL in 2004. Had a blast. But I have no desire to get my PhD. I'm anti-ivory-tower mentality.
You are a braver sole than I...I did a couple years off and on aboard the Air Force's "Hueys" as a Security Specialist pulling Airborne Fireteam duty during Weapons Convoys.
When I found out that the Helo’s require a minimum of 3 hours of maintence for every hour of flight I decided that Vehicle Convoys was much better route.
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