The Complications of the Modern Day College Student

568 Words3 Pages
A college education is a necessity in this modern world. Mine hasn’t been an easy endeavor. It took me years after high school just to realize how important a degree is. Jumping from job to job, I finally realized it wouldn’t get me anywhere in life. I wanted a career. It has been almost four years since I first stepped into a college classroom, and I truly believed that I would not finish the first semester. Attending classes and working full-time finally caught up to me last semester. I just couldn’t handle the workload. What I learned from last semester is that it is a struggle to balance real life and college life in a way to be successful in both. I have never been a great student, and therefore held off college classes for as long as I could get away with it. I find it difficult to find motivation to do work and sit in a classroom for hours on end listening to a lecture. There are many success stories of real life people that never received a degree in higher education, so why couldn’t I do the same? I also knew that I would eventually lose focus and either drop out or end up failing classes by giving into indifference. My resolve to finish had to be motivated by something other than a bigger paycheck or being able to say I have a degree: I had to find a reason to want to be there. Northern Virginia Community College is one of the most affordable schools in the region. That alone makes it one of the most appealing schools to the population in the area. With cost-per-credit rising every semester, even NVCC is beginning to strain my budget. Per semester I have spent around 1500 dollars, which includes tuition, books, and materials. Due to my prior service with the U.S. Air Force, the GI Bill covers only 1/3 of that which still leaves me to foot the bill for about 850 dollars. Since I was working full time as well in order to be able to pay for school, I
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