Archive for July 12th, 2010
BBA
The Dutch might have lost, but I still feel like a winner this week.
It seems ages ago when I stepped into the buildings of the CAH Dronten. When I met Roel, now one of my favorite teachers, and told him that I wanted to enroll to study ‘business administration’. When I told him I only wanted to enroll if I could do the quick program, because I didn’t want to waste a year. (How ironic does that seem now that I have added not 1 but 3 years to the time-table?)
I enrolled. And I did good. I started off by taking the two tests that I had already missed the lessons for by enrolling so late in the year. The two tests that most students still look at as the two hardest tests of all. One of those tests being the one that my friend, ex-roommate and learning buddy took as her very last test to complete her bachelor a little over a week ago. And I passed them.
That first year I didn’t only go to the lessons and pass my tests. I also got introduced to the student association and the sorority. I became an active participant in all extracurricular activities. Both productive (webteam, photography team, family-day organizer, pr team and my last and favorite activity: organizing the introduction week for new students; the ‘KMC’) and the not so productive (organizing and going to a lot of parties).
After my second year (after schoolyear 3) I got kicked out of the student association and it went all downhill from there. I “left” school for half a year, because instead of having to do an internship they allowed me to work on two business projects I was working on for myself. Nice of them, but in those 6 months I adjusted to such a different lifestyle, that I was never able to get back to the student lifestyle again. I bought a puppy and I started working more and more. When it was finally time to go back to school I felt like half of them hated me (for being kicked out of the student association) and the rest of them I didn’t know. I felt uncomfortable at school and started to go less and less. Until, after my third year (schoolyear 4) I practically didn’t go at all.
At that time I only had a couple of reports, tests and my thesis left. I could have finished all that within half a year if I had been able to put my mind to it at that time. But I didn’t. I couldn’t.
A year of being miserable followed. I was a student, but I never studied. I had a minimum-wage job where I only worked the evenings. I slept in every day. I didn’t do much else. I felt like a complete loser.
In 2008 I thought my job at the cinema was preventing me from living a good life. I thought the evening-job was counter-productive for me. I decided that to improve my lifestyle and maybe even to be able to finish school I had to change jobs. On April 17, 2008 I started my job at Printweb Media. It was a good job, with good prospects. I worked 32 hours a week, office times. Why I ever thought that would make me do more for school.. I have no clue. But it did make me feel better about my life. I was working.. I was doing something with my life.
But, I still had to finish school, didn’t I?
After 6 months at Printweb I actually felt a little crazy. The office hours, the shared lunches, the Friday afternoon snacks, the coming home at 7, walking the dog, making dinner, eat and going to bed thinking of doing this all again the next day was killing me. Also, I still wasn’t doing anything for school.
So, to everybody’s surprise, I decided I wanted to go back to the cinema. I missed my work, the work-hours, my colleagues, everything. The world of cinema is a very specific one and I was starting to find out that I love everything about that world. Everybody thought I was crazy.. why would I want to go back to a minimum-wage job with no prospects of growth whatsoever? It was very simple. I wanted it because I knew it would make me happy. I knew it would make me feel free again. And I knew I needed that freedom.
Also, again, I thought that I needed to make this change to have a chance at finishing school.
This is what I wrote on this blog on September 17, 2008:
It’s because I want to finish school. I’m so tired of school. And I’m so tired of doing nothing for it. I haven’t attended one single class last year. Oke. Maybe I attended one. But that’s the maximum. I paid an entire year of tuition for NOTHING. That’s 1700 euros down the drain.
As you can imagine I don’t want to repeat such a wastage. So I decided to focus on school for once and stop with all the excuses and just get my idiotic self to finish the damn thing. So. If I do not have my bachelor degree in February 2009 you may all kick my butt and laugh at my face.
Did you all laugh in February 2009?
I think I might have cried.
Because, of course, changing jobs again had no influence on my curriculum activities whatsoever. On the contrary. It even got so bad that I was getting close to giving up. In November 2008 I realized.. the way I’m going I’m never going to finish. That’s when I made a very weird decision to enroll in a new education: HBO Translator English at the LOI.
The idea behind it was:
- i have ’till June 2009 to make improvements at the CAH. I decided that if I didn’t make any progress by then I’d quit. I wouldn’t pay anymore tuition. I’d give up.
- problem with quitting is. You’re left with a gigantic student loan. A loan of over 20.000 euros, which is a gift when you finish school, but if not: BIG LOAN!
- so, to prevent having to pay back 20.000 euros for not finishing the CAH thing, I started the LOI thing. Because if I’d finish that the loan would also become a gift.
That was my thinking. It sounds ridiculous. But in the end.. it did get me to finish school. I truly believe that. Because ironically enough, once I enrolled in the LOI programme, I started working harder on the CAH courses. I wanted to prove to the people around me that I hadn’t given up fully yet. (Even though I really kind of did.)
So at the end of 2008/beginning 2009 I started completing some CAH courses. It got me hopeful again, but I didn’t want to think of school as my only worry. Somewhere during this time I decided that I should not see my unfinished degree as something that’s holding me back to make further progressions in my life. Because that’s what I had been doing the 5 years before that. I didn’t start new things or make new plans, because I always had this little voice saying in my head: no, you have to finish school!! Even though the voice was right I felt that my personal happiness was more important than getting my degree within a certain period of time. So I decided that my life/job/happiness was more important than the time-line of finishing school. I still wanted to finish, but I didn’t want to let it get in the way of making other decisions. I decided for myself: I’m going to spend 1 day a week on school and I’ll just see how far that gets me. If I finish this year great, if not, I’ll do it next year.
At the end of 2009 my contract at the cinema had to be renewed. I still liked my job, but I wanted more. So I asked for a talk. A talk about possible prospects. A talk about wanting to stay there after I’d finish school. A talk about getting more than minimum-wage in turn for more responsibilities.
That talk was the beginning of my career as theater manager of the cinema I love so much. It came at the worst possible time. Because how can I combine a time-consuming responsible job like that with finishing school? Is that even possible?
YES people, it is! After 6 years of doubt about school, doubt about my career and doubt about pretty much everything else in my life, I can now say that I do not only have my bachelor degree, but that I also have a good life. A very good life. And I wouldn’t trade those 6 years for anything. Because all things in life matter. I’ve learned a lot. About myself, about this life, about the things I want and the things I don’t want. I started this bachelor, not to get a good job, but for self-progression. But in the end, it gave me both. I had a blast being a student and I’m now happy as hell that I’m no student no more. Life is good and I’m happy I’m living it!
That’s the story of my 3-year-education turning into a 6-year-struggle. Why did I post this? Who knows! Why do I do anything that I do? Because it feels right. Because it makes me feel good. And I do feel PRETTY DAMN FANTASTIC!!!