Reaching Lifelong Goals as a Nontraditional Student

It has been a crazy summer!!   I am taking 16 credits with a Math class and a full year of German.   We just finished our second “term” this Summer.    It works out to about a term (GER111, GER112, GER113) every 12 days.   I received a B+ for my German 111 and a “shaky” B for my second term.   I’ll have to pick up my game and pull an A for the final term if I want to have anything like an acceptable GPA this summer (my standards are a little high, I get upset with anything less than a 4.00)   My math class is the final requirement for my baccalaureate core and I will be getting an A in this class.   Summer term is kind of relaxed in other ways, lots of open space in the library, no big crowds in the book store, and parking availability!    The campus of Oregon State University is quite beautiful with wonderful trees and lots of green areas.   It is a pleasure to spend my days just walking around “My” campus.   I get a little misty eyed, realizing this experience is a culmination of a life long goal.   I do have some free time to walk around and just enjoy the college experience that has been 35 years delayed.   Most of my day is spent in the OSU Valley Library.   My floor is the 6th, where all of the wonderful collection of history books reside.   I will be spending a lot of time digging through the racks, browsing  and researching History projects.   With the pace of keeping up with German lessons, I have tried to limit myself to only a couple of sessions a week.

The whirlwind pace of German in Summer Term is a real challenge, but I can recommend this type of total committment to a language first year if you can swing it.   I am packing a lot of information into this old non traditional student head, it is nearly full, not much more room left!   When you start dreaming about conjugating verbs and vocab tests, it must be a sign of information overload…   One benefit of this type of class schedule is that you really get to put learning skills to work in a major way.    Starting in the fall, I’ll be heading into second year German, only taking one section per term.   I will have to shift gears and make sure to study a little German every day and not put the homework off til the night before a class.

One of the buildings on campus that I will be spending many hours in is Kidder Hall, which is located across the Quad from the Valley Library.   This facility is one of the older buildings on campus and it has a “vintage college” feel to it.   I am taking in all of the experiences of being in college with an appreciation of what I missed so many years ago.   Even the creaking floors and windows excite me!  Being a non traditional student is more to me than just returning to school.   It has become a life changing experience, and I am trying to get every last drop out of it.   Older students returning to college is the overall theme of Reaching Lifelong Goals.com, but I’m finding the experience to be so much more than that.