If I Can Do It, So Can You

Last month I did it – I finally finished my Bachelor’s degree in Business Administration. I can’t even tell you how amazing it felt to walk across that stage.

Just as awesome was seeing how proud my dad was of me. I’ve mentioned on here before that I’m the first person in my entire family to graduate college. Actually, on my mom’s side, I think I might even be the first person to graduate high school. It’s not that education wasn’t considered important in my family, it just wasn’t a given the way it is for other people who have the means to pay their kids’ tuition.

My journey got interrupted a few times. Naturally, I took time off while I was pregnant with Levi. I tried going back shortly after he was born, but my unexpected surgeries landed me in the hospital and I missed enough classes my professors recommended I drop the semester and wait to come back.

I’m so glad I did. Working full time, being a mom, and going to school don’t have to be mutually exclusive. There are tons of programs out there these days designed specifically for adult learners that can’t attend traditional day school for some reason or another.

Ivy Bridge College is one of these schools – they have a pretty cool program designed to help you get your Associates degree in as little as 17 months (typically it takes two years at a traditional college or university.) About half of their student population are moms with kids, so they “get it” – that sometimes you need flexibility so you can study around nap time or sometimes you need a little extra tutoring because your infant doesn’t sleep through the night and you lose a little information along with your missing sleep.

I didn’t get my Associate’s degree for a really lame reason – I couldn’t pass the placement test to get into College Algebra because I couldn’t remember all that sin, cosin, and tangent stuff from back in high school and I didn’t want to pay for a tutor to help me or take a lower level class to get caught up. I wish my school had offered free tutoring like Ivy Bridge does, because then I would have been a college graduate several years ago (with my Associate’s – College Algebra was the only class I was missing to finish the degree). That would have paid off big time on my resume and salary negotiations, but oh well, I’m past that now. But if you can do better than me and get yours, I guarantee it will help improve your marketability and will make it super easy to transfer into a 4-year program at another school.

Ivy Bridge has generously offered to let me help one of my readers get a head start with a $1000 tuition discount*. I’ll be choosing one person at random from the comments on this post to award the $1000 tuition discount to on Thursday, January 24th. Just leave me a comment about why you’d like to go back to school or what program you’re currently working on.

*To be eligible for the $1,000 discount off tuition at IvyBridge College (IBC), the qualifying individuals will need to be degree seeking, enrolled in IBC a minimum of part-time, and new to IBC (specifically, not someone who has already applied to, enrolled in, or requested information from IBC). Classes at Ivy Bridge College Extension are not eligible for the discount. Limit one per person.The tuition discount is valid through September 1, 2013.

I participated in a campaign on behalf of Mom Central Consulting for Ivy Bridge College. I received a promotional item as a thank-you for participating and a discount on classes at Ivy Bridge College.