Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Getting to Know the Trinity Community, Job Hunting, & Scholarship Rewards


As it is getting closer to high school graduation, I’ve been spending a lot of time both reflecting on my past and planning out my future. Last Sunday afternoon, Trinity hosted their Admitted Student Day where I was able to go and visit with other students who are planning on or at least considering (for those who haven’t made commitments to any schools yet) attending Trinity next Fall along with meeting some of the faculty members, current students, and alumini.
                I must say, it’s a weird sensation to be standing in a room amoung complete strangers who will soon become highly influencial over the next four years of my life. Some will be my proffessors, mentors, coaches, tutors, classmates, co-workers, best friends, roommates…who knows, maybe my future spouse was in that room. How strange is that? After the school president, John Reed, along with some other speakers finished-up their presentations many of us drove to Trinity’s Boathouse for a BBQ that Trinity’s Crew Team was hosting. I talked to some of the students who are currently part of crew and they seemed to love it! Now of course, they’re trying to recruit me by telling me that I get to wake-up early enough to watch the sunrise over the Cascade Mountains from the water.
                They all make it sound like a lot of fun, but I know it’ll get exhausting doing all those hard workouts everymorning. Speaking of hard-work I’ve been thinking about some of the unique job opportunities I could have in Downtown Everett or Seattle and there are a lot of options. Maybe I could get a job right across from Trinity at the Everett YMCA or just a few blocks away I could work at the Comcast Arena or at the Everett Performing Arts Center. If I’m willing to drive into Seattle there are plenty of opportunities working at various musems, tour companies, theaters, ect. Or more specialized places like the Seattle Aquarium or Pike Place Market…who knows what kind of job is out their just waiting for me to come along!
                Getting a higher education from a private school is certainly not cheap, but they do give out some nice scholarships. So far I’ve received an Honors Scholarship worth $6,000 and the Lenore Meyers Scholarship worth $3,000 (for one year only). The Honors Scholarship is just for my grades and the Lenore Meyers Scholarship is for students planning on going into Trinity’s CYFS (Children, Youth,  and Family Studies) Program. Apparently, in the past years I would have received the full $10,000 for the Lenore Meyers Scholarship, but they had alot of highly eligible applicants this year and I was one of the top five so they had some left over money in the CYFS budget and decided to give each of us who would have received the full scholarship in the past a non-renewable scholarship for $3,000.

Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Life Altering Decision

     A few weeks ago I turned 18 and it was really strange…I was overcome by all these mixed emotions of both the excitement and fears of becoming a young adult. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my future and the expectations that others have of me. My parents want me to go to Eastern Washington University because it’s the cheapest in-state university. But I want to go to Trinity Lutheran College, go into their Children, youth, and family Studies program and become a youth director or a pastor. My youth director keeps telling me I don’t need a fancy college degree to work in the church and wants me to go straight into an internship with him next fall, but I don’t want to disappoint my family by not going to college.
     I suppose it never really was my plan or idea to even go to college in the first place, but more an idea placed on me by society that college is the “only option” and the only way to be “successful” in life. Isn’t it strange how by the time we’re half way through our junior year of high school society expects us to have our entire life planned out ahead of us? I find it scary that the college decision we make as a 17 or 18 yr-old in high school pretty much determines where we end up going and ultimately what we end up doing for the rest of our lives. If you ask me, that’s a lot of pressure to put on teenagers! I’m so young…why does society expect me to make such a life altering decision at such a young age?