GradHacking: Finding Your Path

Eric Riley April 3, 2018

Song of the Day

Life is a highway

I wanna ride it all night long

If you’re going my way way

I wanna drive it all night long

Rascal Flatts

Hello GradHackers! I hope you all had a wonderful two weeks without me and we’re safe during spring break for those of you who still like to party. I come to you guys with a personal experience on how I found what I wanted to do with my college career. I know I touched on parts of it on my original post, but I want to give you all the full run down in hopes that it will at least help one person reading this.

It all started when I was in high school and I was getting closer to graduation, being lazy and not really thinking about my future. Needless to say all I was worried about was getting out of high school. Poor decision by me. I applied to different colleges throughout senior year, but I knew a couple things going into it: 1. I wanted to stay close to home, 2. I wanted to be close to family, and 3. I wanted a school that had a physical therapy degree. So, naturally I would apply to Gulf Coast for their physical therapy assistant degree and I also applied to University of West Florida. I considered West Florida because my sister went there at the time and offered to let me live with her during school free of charge, which for any kid looking to get out of their parents house ASAP this sounded like the best option for me. I looked into the programs more and more over at West Florida but found myself getting lost in all the information. I would call to talk to advisers at the college but I never got someone that could really give me those clear answers I was looking for. That hindered my opinion of the school, so I decided to stay home and go to Gulf Coast instead in hopes that my family and the advising center at Gulf Coast could help me get my life on track. Luckily for me I had people around me that were full of opinions on what I should do with my life; sometimes it was helpful but most times it just caused more confusion in my decision making. My parents and my sister would tell me to go do something that involved sports, because I love sports I’ve played them my whole life. So, initially I thought that was a good idea. I kept looking at the physical therapy degrees, but I knew one thing; I wanted to get my general studies out of the way then I would focus on my future or my bigger goals. I took two years completing all the classes people complain about, music, psychology, literature, etc.. Personally I enjoyed my general studies, because I didn’t have any stress yet. I felt like I was at ease because I was able to take classes without worrying about the future.

Then it hit me like a ton of bricks. Two more semesters and I’ve got my AA and I still don’t know what I want to do yet. So, I went back to the drawing board. I talked to the campus advisers that basically just helped me sign up for classes the majority of the time and never gave me any life advice like I was expecting, until I started fumbling through the degrees Gulf Coast offered on the website catalog. This is your friend! Everything is listed for you to see, all the degrees, and how to complete them. This was my saving grace, the website catalog and help from my girlfriend (who basically told me to get my s*** together and think about what I liked to do) were how I found the Digital Media Program and my ULTIMATE ADVISER Dr. Goines. Coming into the Digital Media Program I knew two things, I liked sports and I enjoyed working with cameras; what a perfect match for me. I had no idea the program even existed until I took the time to go online and look at the website. Then I scheduled an appointment with Dr. Goines and she talked to me and finally asked me what I wanted to do and what I was interested in; also she gave me options that the digital media program had to offer. She did everything any adviser I had talked to before didn’t do that I was hoping they would. She’s amazing at her job, to say the least. After a long talk about my life and what I thought I wanted to do at the time, Dr. Goines made me a course map which told me what classes I needed to complete to finish both my AA and my bachelors program. I was ecstatic having finally found a path or vision of what I needed to do to. I am where I am today because of Dr. Goines, my family, and my amazing girlfriend. We all have people in our life who think they know what’s best for us, but don’t dismiss them because sometimes the information they give you could be useful.

Looking back on my experience before I found the program I was scatter brained; as most under graduates are. I don’t know what I want to do for the rest of my life? Who makes these hard decisions at 20 years old? It seemed like a crazy idea to find a job or career path that you would most likely do forever. I just knew one thing going into it, I want to do something fun. I want to have a job that doesn’t feel like a job. I want to enjoy going to work every morning. This is what everyone should look for when searching for their career. Use your tools at the school whether it be the school website or an adviser. Just a tip, try and get a general idea of what you might want to do and then go talk to the people that work in that department. Don’t talk to the general advisers unless you need to, you’ll get real life questions answered by the people that have been working in the field. Another tip is to not be afraid to ask those hard questions, most professors or department advisers are there to answer them and help you find out what you want to do. They want us to succeed! Let them help you! It will be worth it, trust me I know from experience. Thank you all for reading if you’ve made it this far, for those of you that did I will leave a couple links below on more life tips and help on picking your career path provided to us by Rascal Flatts and Tedx Talks. It’s a hard decision, but you don’t have to make it alone.

About The Author