Crossroads

So tonight was my final in Speech and Language Development. I am happy that the class is over because I found the work to be very time consuming. The topic matter was very interesting and I definitley gained a new knowledge and appreciation for language and how it is formed. I am crossing my fingers that I did well on my final because the grades on my previous exams (midtem , a&p quiz a&p quiz retake) were not that great. I am hoping also that the grade on my presentation I did on Tuesday willl help to boost my grade at least a little bit.

Right now I find myself at a crossroads. Clearly from I have struggled in the past two Speech and Language Pathology classes I am not really sure if this is the right path for me to go down. One of the main things that I want to do is find some kind of way to make a difference in life of children with disabilites and I figured Speech and Language Development would be the perfect way to do that since I had a speech disorder when I was younger but overcame it due to working with a speech and language pathologist.Figured I could make the same type of difference in a child's life that the speech and language patholigist I had when I was younger did for me. I did not expect to be bombarded with so much information all at once both from this class and the class I took over the summer. It was a lot for me to take in and catalog in my brain. Especially all the medical terminology. I feel like I have let myself down in a huge way because I wasn't able to get a good grade in these course.
As I said right now I am at a crossroads because I do not know if going back to school is even the best option for me right now. I was considering switching my major to Medical Coding and not taking classes again til January but I might end up deciding to totally bypassing school all together because I need money to pay for the tuition and I can't afford it right now. I feel like it would be better if I just focussed on getting more skills in the workplace so I can eventually get a job in the field I got my degree in at NEC.

So much to think about it.. right now it's time for bed. Working at Target 11-3 tomorrow so I neeed my beauty rest.

Janine

Mix Bag

The murder in Mont Vernon has completley turned this community upside down. I am still in shock about the whole thing and that 2 kids from Souhegan were charaged in conncetion with crime. It is very eerie how close to home this whole thing hits... truly eerie and truly amazing.
Right now I should be studying for my final for speech and language development.. I will get back to that as soon as I am done writing in here. Overall the class the been very interesting. The course load has been demanding and somewhat challenging. So much material was thrown at me at once and I feel like there wasn't enough time to catalog it all in my brain. I did learn a lot though. It gave me an intereting perspective on how people communicate with each other. Due to financial issues I will be taking a break from school from the time being so I can take sometime to think if Speech Lang Path is the field I want to persure. If this not end up being my choice I still have my degeee from NEC to fall back on and will continue to look for a job in that field or jobs at theatres in the public relations department.
Possible Fields of study I could into instead of Speech Lang Path if I decide to go back to school in January:

• Marketing Certificate
• Spreadsheet Certificate
• Early Childhood Certificate
• Human Services Certificate

So we'll see where things end up with that.

Alumni Weekend a few weeks ago made me really nostalgic about NEC. I don't really miss the town of Henniker because there is not much to do there but I miss the general atmosphere of NEC and all my friends. Basically I just miss being in the college setting.

I miss

• Theatre
• SEC Events
• Midnight Madness
• Movie nights with my friends
• International Night
• Pancake Breakfasts at the end of each semester

I do not miss

• 3:30 am fire alarms
• 8:30 am classes (luckily I did not have too many of those)
• Anxiety I put myself under about passing certain classes and getting on deans list
• the food at Gilmore Dining Hall (except for the omlettes and the ice cream)

I wonder if things would have been different if I had chosen to major in education at NEC?When I was thinking about going back to school for Speech Pathology that thought constantly ran through my head and it still irks me. At the time when I was deciding on what to major in at NEC I was having a really hard time deciding what to study. I was choosing between education and communications because I had two passions that I wanted to persue.. working with kids and writing. Theatre was an added passion but I didn't think there was too much I could do with that since acting is not really a strength. I consider that more a hobby then something I could make a job out of. Not trying to offend people who are studying theatre or who have studied it. I am sure people find their own individual succeses in whatever field they choose. I chose to stick with my passion for writing and study communications. At this point I am not saying I regret that choice.. I just wonder if things would have been different if I had chosen to major in education or could have found some way to create my own major in order to combine all three passions (education.writing and theater) together. I guess it will just take a while to find a niche and a job that I truly like. Right now I am working at Target and that is going well so far. Can't complain too much really. I do think I need a second job or find some way to get more hours so I can start paying back my loans from NEC. I also still have my freelance job at the Milford Cabinet which is going well.

Something else I have constantly wondered about my four years at NEC is how much different things would have been if I had not been involved in so many clubs? I met a great deal of people through being involved in various clubs at NEC and had fun being involved in all the activities the clubs put together. However, a thing I had a lot of issues with was time management skills and managing my time between meetings, going to events and homework. I realized that if I had done a better job at managing my time and given myself more time to focus on my homework then I would have done better in my classes and been able to more easily achieve the goal of making deans list each semester. If I could go back and do my four years at NEC all over I think the main thing I would do diffferent would to have not to have been part of so many activities. My goal with being involved on campus was to get a good diversity of activites under my belt and mix old experiences with new ones. That goal was very easily accomplished. I was in 13 clubs at one point and that was way too many clubs to be in. I often found myself to be frazzled because as the years went along the work load in my classes got relativley harder. As I said before time management was a HUGE issue for me

If I could do my four years at NEC over again these are clubs I would have joined and stuck with throughout the entirity of my four years

• Carriage Theatre Ensemble (student run theatre troupe)
• CAB/SEC (Student Activities Committee)
• WNEC (Radio Station) had i not been involved in so many other things I would have had more time to do my show
• New Englander (Newspaper)
• TEACH (community service club for education majors)

Well.. enough procratinating back to homework.

Janine

Murder!

So over the weekend there was a murder in the neighboring town of Mt Vernon. It is eerie that something like that could happen so close to home and even eerier that two high school kids from the high school I graduated from five years ago have been charaged with being connected to the crime. Something of this nature would be expected in a big city like Manchester. But Mont Vernon? No.. not at all. Everyone in my town is in total shock and I am too.

Alumni Weekend 2009

This weekend was homecoming weekend at NEC. My best friend Alli from NEC came to visit me for the weekend and it was so great to see her. Friday morning I did homework and then Matt came @ 3:45 and we went to go get Ali at Manchester Airport. After we picked up Ali we went out to dinner at Longhorn Steakhouse. I got fried shrimp... maybe not the best choice for the diet I am supposed to be on because the last time I went to the doctors my cholesterol was a little high. After that we went to Souhegan to watch the football game. It is so different to be going back to SHS to watch any type of event after having been out of that school for five years. Mostly because the last of the people that I knew graduated the year I was a freshmen at New England College and the only people I know who still go there are my sister and all of her friends. The game was pretty good.. though by the end of the third quarter it was clearly obvious that Souhegan was going to win the game but at least it wasn't a total washout like the last game when Souhegan won 48-0. Yesterday I had to work and it was pretty much a day in reveiw because I got trained to work in the fitting room and since I have done that at Marshalls and TJ Maxx it was pretty self-explanitory and easy training though there were a few new things that I learned. After work Matt Ali and I headed up to Henniker. We missed the barbecue by about 10 minutes so we went to Sonny's Main Street Pizza for lunch... made a somewhat better food choice and got pasta alfredo with brocolli. The weather was really crummy and we estimate that that is why the attendance was so low. Most of the people in my immediate group of friends had to work but I got to see a lot of people I hadn't seen in awhile. After hanging out in the pub and catching up with old friends we went to the fieldhouse for the Rennisaince Fair which was where a few clubs had tables set up selling things and local artists were selling their artwork. There was also a magician but we just caught the end of his show. Since it was family weekend I didn't get to see a lot of my friends who still go to school there since they were doing stuff with their parents but I will mostly likely see them in a few weeks when I got up to see the Carriage Theatre Ensembe play Seasonal Help. Being at NEC definitly flooded me with a lot of memories from my time there from movie nights to theatre shows from Spring Weekend to March Madness from performances in the coffeehouse to comedians, I miss the people I went to school with moreso then the town of Hennker. A lot of stuff haschanged since I left.. especially a much needed update to the Simon Center Cafe in terms of food and ambience. I have yet to try the food though. I will have to do that the next time I go up there at the end of the month. Aside from the weather Alumni Weekend was awesome and I can't wait til next year. After driving home in what seemed like a torriential down pour we went out to dinner at Red Arrow Dinner.. hot dogs and beans for dinner and a small taste of Ali's Mac and Cheese. I feel like I should have gotten something a lot healthier then a hot dog. I don't even eat hot dogs a lot except during the summer at barbecues.


In other news.. I have been so stressed out because of my class at the tech college. I have realized since my last entry that the course material is way too over my head. I have decided not to continue with the major. There goes one dream out the window but it's better to give up now because the classes will just continue to get harder. It may not be in my best interest to go back to school right now. At this point I am completley confused about the path I should take. I may consider going back taking the rest of the semester off and then take medical coding classes in January but I am leaning closer and closer toward just focussing on work for the time being so I can pay back my loans from New England College. My job at Target is off to a fabulous start. I am really liking it so far and meeting a lot of new people.

That's it for now.

Love

Jamine