Great postings from other nontraditional students

There are many nontraditional students who have blogs today. I have gotten some great advice and thoughts from all of them.

This Art is from the Microsoft Images pgs.

Every once in awhile, I list a couple of great blogs and postings here on the Betsyanne Nontraditional Student Blog for people who have not yet checked them out on the left hand side of the blog (some links are there) or online.

Here are just two out of many great blogs and sites I like.

#1. Older Non-Trad Student - this is one of my very favorite blogs. Zickbee lives in Ashville, North Carolina. She recently graduated and has her graduation picture up on the site. She is still a nontraditional student, though, and is still taking a college class this semester.Her latest post is "Are You Auditing?" I think that auditing a class could tempt a student not to work as hard and maybe not to learn as much.

#2. GED Stories - this blog features actual emails from people going back to school to get their GED. They talk about successes, fears, and what getting a GED means to them. Some of these stories are really touching.

I like to visit this site as often as I can, because sometimes I can get tunnel vision about who I am helping. It's not just college students. I have to remind myself sometimes that going back to school can mean getting a GED, which can open many doors for nontraditional students.

I think people can encourage other people here just by commenting and encouraging GED students and other nontraditional students who blog about their experiences.

What is a favorite blog that helps nontraditional students that you read regularly or know about? Please list it below as a comment. Thank you!

Some Nontrad links: The Nontrad site and blog Join Nontrads on Facebook Nontrads on Yahoo Nontrads on Twitter

Grandpa gets a webcam - shades of some Nontrads?

 Be truthful. Have you ever seen a nontraditional student who didn't know how to operate a computer?

These oldsters don't know that they are being recorded. This YouTube video has now gone viral, and has been shown on the Today Show and also Good Morning America.

I think you'll find it cute. I liked it.




Back to talking about nontrads though. I had a couple of nontraditional students in my speech class who seriously did not know how to access the class blackboard files online. This really became a problem further along in the class. We all tried to help, but they probably thought they could figure it out themselves. Anyway, they missed an online assignment and that hurt.

So what did I learn from their problem? Maybe to advise some nontraditional students to brush up on computer skills. And maybe some nontraditional student groups need to ask about having a refresher course available at their school to access coursework and learn how to access blackboard and other school sites.

I would time this for before school starts.

Just saying.

Hope you like the funny video.

Some Nontrad links: The Nontrad site and blog
Join Nontrads on Facebook
Nontrads on Yahoo
Nontrads on Twitter 

Here is the signup for the Nontrad Newsletter too:

Many would-be nontraditional students can get in a rut and put dreams off to someday...

In a cubicle - from the Microsoft Clipart pages.

Responsibility for others... 

Older people can sometimes be very responsible... for other people.

And nontraditional students going back to school after a break - or thinking about it -  can spend a lot of time doing things for other people, and ignoring themselves.

Sometimes life just happens. You get married, you have a child or children, you are working full-time and feeling more comfortable, but really you are in a rut.

You just  do what you have to do, and that is a choice of honor for many. And it's easy to forget what you really wanted to do, once upon a time.

Putting dreams off... to "someday".

What ever happened about college - about trade school - about those dreams you or others used to have? Well, many times, they are put on the back shelf. There is only so much time, and there are responsibilities people have to others, to family, parents, or (sometimes) to debt collectors or things they must have and pay for.

It's great when a student has somebody else to help, maybe a family or partner, or money set back. But that is not always the case for many people.

When you - or somebody else - can break through and go back to school, it can be the start of a whole new life, greater happiness, fulfillment, and a change for the better. As I hear a lot, it can be "a dream come true."

Looking towards the future - from the MS Clipart Pages.

Do you know somebody who wants to go back to school? Or maybe it is you yourself? Try these links out for size, and see what opportunities are out there for you.

A nontraditional student can start going back to school anytime... in the spring, next fall, next summer, or sometimes right now.

Here is the official FAFSA site - find out what help is available for nontraditional students wanting to go back to school.

  




And check out the 3 most popular postings here on the BA Nontrad Blog:

 Finding Scholarships and Grants for School

 Thinking about Graduate School - is it for you?

 Michelle Fabio's Introduction to Law School for Nontraditional Students

Some more nontraditional student links:
The Nontrad site and blog
Join Nontrads on Facebook
Nontrads on Yahoo
Nontrads on Twitter

I changed my title today. I like it! Plus some other NT links...

Dear nontraditional students and fans,

I changed my blog name today; just a little. I added my name, Betsyanne, to it.

So now this blog is The Betsyanne Nontraditional Student Blog. The main reason I did this change is because there are SO many other nontrad blogs now, it's easy to mistake it.

Plus I sign my blog "Betsyanne" anyhow, so it really goes with it. That and adding "Betsyanne" to the title logo, it's official.

Talking about other blogs, these  current blogs are closest to my OLD name:

Older Non-Trad Student (by Zickbee)
and
Non-Traditional Students (by Linda S. Pogue)


Anyway, I think this is an improvement in this blog.

I hope you all had a great holiday weekend. For those new students out there, how is it going? Has school started yet?

All for now,

Former Nontraditional Student

And here are some more Nontrad links:
The Nontrad site and blog
Join Nontrads on Facebook
Nontrads on Yahoo, and
Nontrads on Twitter

What will you be when you grow up?

Did your parents tell you that you could achieve anything? People sometimes say there weren't that many choices when they were growing up. But my parents said I could do whatever I wanted to do. (Isn't that a good thing? I wish all parents would say that! But I digress...)

Some of my dream job ideas when I was growing up
I did consider some unusual choices for a job, like scientist, inventor, time traveler, treasure hunter, etc. but usually came back to my Serious List of journalist, writer, artist, environmentalist, or teacher (among others).

Fate steered me in another direction altogether. 

Events seemed to derail my plans of staying in school, so instead of going on past my B.A. to get trained for something (I had an English degree because I had to graduate finally and had more credits in this...) I then got a "Job job".

What is a "Job job"? 
You know what this is; it's the real kind of job where you work full time and support yourself. You start at the bottom and work your way up. You learn all the basics from people who are there already, then learn all you can. If you are lucky, you move on to learn more and get an even better position.

I did learn many things and moved into several responsible positions, including Assistant Manager at a small printshop. Then later I moved into a job at a larger firm, becoming a graphic artist and proofreader there.

Sometimes people move backwards at their job instead of forwards. 

It's when I began being regularly assigned the entry-level kinds of things I did when I first started out that I first knew I should go back to school. I was back where I started, going backwards instead of learning new things. It was just a matter of time, I decided.

I do like to learn new things. Luckily, going backwards was not something I had to do for long. Even though I had taught myself computing from the ground up, all kinds of computer programs, scheduling, design, etc. in the printing trade, it seemed as though my age and lack of certification finally did me in and I was laid off. Perhaps I should have gone back to school a lot earlier, I thought.
Since my grandmother had been a teacher, I thought that doing that might be fun too. I had both English and Art to pick from, and I picked English, thinking that would have more jobs available.

Now after going through school again, my dream list has changed. 
I learned so much going back to school. Now I have a brand new list of What I Want to Be When I Grow Up. It turns out being a writer can apply to somebody who has a blog. Who knew? And now I can be published so much easier than ever before. I have already done 2 (free) books and plan to polish them up and add to them for a pay version this or next year.
I also learned that even though things don't always go my way, I can always choose a new path. Am I grown up yet? That's a good question. In one sense, being responsible, I can say yes, I am.

I don't like to be stuck in a job I don't like. I'm sure I'm not alone in thinking this. 

I don't think it's part of growing up to feel that you must be unhappy to be a grownup. I do not think that being grown up means being stuck to one dream, or (worse) being stuck in somebody else's dream. I hope you are not in that position, because I know how it feels to be stuck.
Personally, I now have more than one dream, as always. But now my dreams about my "perfect job" have changed. I think this is part of growing as a person, no matter what your age is.

Here are some questions for you, my reader, to answer.

My questions to my readers today are these: What are or were YOUR dreams? What did you want to be when you grew up? Did you change your mind later? Will you go back to school to try and realize one or more of them?

Tell me why you feel as you do.

I really look forward to reading my comments!

Former Nontraditional Stude

Thanks for stopping by to read my blog today.

And here are some more of my Nontrad links:
The Nontrad site and blog
Join Nontrads on Facebook
Nontrads on Yahoo
Nontrads on Twitter 

Come and join me there too. Thanks!

FYI: The other neat pieces of clipart here on the blog are from the Clker Free clipart Site.