It is not typical for a first year teacher to already apply for Graduate school. Typically, educators wait 3-4+ years. There are several reasons why most do not do it so quickly. My personal reasons were:
- I wanted to enjoy my first few years as a teacher and really focus on learning how to even be a teacher.
- I wanted to start my family so I wouldn't have the stress of meeting deadlines or doing course work while on maternity leave
- I didn't want to face the extra financial stress
- I wanted a break from college. Hell- I just graduated in December 2009
This all changed because of an email we received from our Union Reps on Wednesday. It said:
"The grandfather clause, as shown is HB 1001, permits those who begin advanced degree courses before 7/1/2011 to receive salary schedule credit for degrees completed by 9/2/2014.
If you’ve been putting off starting a masters program, you need to enroll as a degree seeking graduate student and start working on that degree before July 1st of this year. If you are already in an advanced degree program or start an advanced degree program before July 1st, you need to complete the degree work before 9/2/2014 in ordered to be grandfathered."
What this is saying is that if I am not enrolled in graduate school by this July, my base pay will be based off of having my bachelors degree. I would no longer be eligible to benefit financially from having a masters.
Wednesday night I did a lot of researching. I found a program at IUPUI that I liked- but the deadlines had already passed. It looked like my best option was to go with an online graduate degree program through Ball State. After talking with coworkers on Thursday, I came home Thursday and applied.
(funny story...apparently when filling out the online application I clicked "Yes" to the question: Have you ever been convicted of a felony? I received an email that night telling me that basically this wasn't going to fly and I need to fill out all of this paperwork. haha. whoopsie. It then said if it was a mistake, I could simply respond to the email and fix the mistake----which I did immediately.)
[Back to IUPUI] One of the chairman's for the graduate school is an old professor of mine. I emailed her Wednesday about whether or not that deadline was final or if I could still apply. I hadn't thought much more about it after I applied to Ball State until I got an email Friday afternoon from a woman at IUPUI telling me she would do everything she could to get me enrolled for the summer session beginning in June. As I look through her email, I can see there have been many conversations about me being sent to random people and it was decided that I could go ahead and apply. She told me that "when" I get accepted, let her know and she will enroll me.
So, last night I applied to IUPUI's online Graduate Program for Elementary Education with a focus on technology. This means, I have now applied to 2 graduate programs-- I will go for the IUPUI one because it is a system I am already familiar with--- however, I'd be happy to do Ball State if IUPUI turns me down.
I'm not going to lie, I was good at college and actually enjoyed it. I can honestly say that I am getting kind of excited about going back. (permitting one of them accepts me)
:)
:)
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