So, one day late last year,.... I did more digging, and found through the university that they had a photojournalism class. Hmm... wonder if this is what I would be looking for??? I put a call into the teacher, and spoke with him all about it. This was probably in October. After his talk, I was pretty pumped up about the class, sounded EXACTLY what I was looking for. He said he thought the class was about $300.00. Eh, not bad I guess. I was very anxious about doing this, and couldn't wait to get started.
I made some calls, and found out I needed my shot record... or at least a record of having had 2 MMR shots. HUH??? I'm nearly 37yrs old!!! SHOT RECORD? LOL Yeah right. I grew up in CA and had NO idea where to start. Mom got our shots done at the Health Dept, I called all over with no luck. I worried that this would interfere with my getting into the spring time class,.... it was getting close by this time for registering and such. Thankfully I found out that there was a clinic on campus that I could get my shot done for free!! Yay!!!!
One day in Dec I headed to the campus,.... keep in mind, I graduated in 1987 from High School and took a whole semester of Jr College the year after that, I was pretty nervous. I've never been on a University campus before. It was huge. I parked in the wrong spot and had quite the hike to the registration office. The clinic was convieintly located at the OTHER end of the campus,.... drove over there and back again (found the closer parking this time) and got everything set.... and the shot cost $5.00, can't beat that I suppose huh??? I needed to wait about a couple days to get into the system then I would be able to enroll in the course I wanted. I left there feeling very excited!!! I couldn't wait. I also stopped in and got my parking permit,..... you know that darned thing costs $50.00!!!! Sheesh. I was going to pay for it then, but no no, it will be put on your registration bill or whatever the heck it is.... ahhh... okay.... works I guess... so at this point I'm thinking about $350.00 now right????
I'm all set!!! I think...... as Christmas draws closer,... I get a letter stating that I still need another MMR shot.... well dang, they had told me I'd be okay with just the one. I KNOW I had one at least as a kid! I couldn't call until after the holidays, and class was to start Jan 9th!!! I wasn't even enrolled in a class yet either!! I was getting worried again that I'd not make it.
Well,... finally after talking to a few people after New Years, I found that so long as I get the second shot done, I'd be fine..... and that I could get enrolled now and did just that over the phone!! I was all set for my first class,.... and it was only like 4 days away!!!! Wow, talk about cutting it close huh???
Mon. Jan. 9th!!! I was fairly nervous that morning. Something so new and exciting for me. I was up and ready to go in no time!! I got there in plenty of time and even had an easy time finding where the building was (using the map of course) but my 30mins being early was spoiled due to driving around the lot a few dozen times trying to find a place to park!!! Did I mention that it costs $50.00 for the permit??? You'd think I'd have a place to park for that huh??? However, such was NOT going to be the case. I found a spot acrossed the street aways,.... worked just fine. I got into class with about 10mins to spare. I entered the small room, with like 30 chairs and 3 other students sitting there waiting. They were SOOO young.... I felt so old LOL I found a desk and sat down and waited nervously. While sitting there I overheard a girl talking about her courses,... one of which was horseback riding!!! WHAT???? A CLASS FOR HORSEBACK RIDING???? NO WAY!!!!! I totally want to do that :o)
The room filled slowly,.... I think by the time the teacher walked in, there were maybe 6 desks open??? I also saw that I was the only one who brought their camera,..... dork. He took roll,... I'm not sure where he is from, but he has an accent, and assured us his feelings would not be hurt if we had to ask him to repeat anything. He passed out the class syllabus, which we spent the rest of the class time reading over. He even picked on individuals to read the paragraphs. I found this amusing. Didn't we outgrow that in grade school???? I learned that I did need to enroll for the lab,... this would be how we would submit our work. I really hoped that I'd need not take it, as the hours conflict with being a mom/wife!! I spoke with the teacher at the end of class who directed me to the lab instructor. I really thought, why not get the software, do what needed to be done, and upload the picture to the school server???? Sounds easy enough. Well, apparently the school's server is to its own,.... outsiders can't get in????? Maybe it's me, but that seems odd. So, now to figure out how to work this out. Seemed pointless to take the class and not turn in work ya know?? Even if the plan was to audit the course.
So, yes, that was day one. It went fairly well I thought. I was pretty excited about the upcoming projects, and even pretty curious about how the lab worked. Just the matter of figuring out how to make the lab work for us. Hubby and I talked and figured we would just try and work around it some how.
Wed. Jan 11th 2nd class.... that morning, I made some calls,.... got enrolled for the lab and talked to a girl who was going to help me out with the payment deal. I had no clue at this time how much I was going to have to pay for these classes. I knew that the lab wasn't much, I thought it was around $20.00. I didn't have my student ID or anything,..... I knew nothing. Such a noob. She gave me my student ID number, and showed me around online how to view all my information. Would you believe that the lab is only $10.00??? Not bad huh??? Makes up for the $612.00 for all the OTHER CRAP!!! The photography class is like $424.00 and then they throw in all these other fees,...... it's almost like looking at your phone bill. What is this for??? and this???? she tells me how I can get into the games free as a student.... well, great, only I hate football, and basketball..... we have a great gym here as well.... eh,... that might be something I would consider doing for about 5mins.... really, it was pretty silly. Oh and don't forget that $50.00 parking permit too!!! Sheesh. You could say that my bubble was burst then. How could we possibly do this????? Then she told me they do have a pymt option. Ohh???? This sounded good!! She explained and it sounded doable. I was ready to head to class,.... poked my head into the bedroom where hubby was sleeping, to let him know I was headed out. I said "You remember how I thought the class was going to be about $300.00??" "yeah,.... it's more?" "yeah" "how much more??" "a lot.... but we'll talk about it when I get home"
This session was basically the history of photography. I took a few notes,.... listened along. He told us that next Weds we needed to bring in our cameras and we would look them over and ask questions or whatever. Cool. I was smarter this time, and didn't bring mine with me. I spoke with the lab guy again,... he said that if I can't make the lab time that I registered for, I could attend one of the other times, NO problem. That was very reassuring. I was a bit worried about that.
Got home and talked to hubby about everything. The pymt deal was cool... but we talked more about other options. The girl I spoke with mentioned a Pell Grant, but we both felt sure that that couldn't happen. I remembered that his company had some sort of deal, but had no clue how that worked. He said he would look into it. The next day he talked with one girl, who was sure all you had to do was fill out a paper and provide your grade/receipts and you get reimbursed. Hmmm..... he tried to get in touch with the girl that actually handled that part of it all, but I guess she was out of the office that day.
Today I called,.... as I have class tomorrow and want to know what the heck we're gonna do. That's exactly how it works, only I've gotta have a 2.0+ gpa. That's rough LOL So, looks like I'm going to school LOL We talked about maybe an Assoc. in Photojournalism,.... but we'll see. Right now this class should hold everything I want to know. I would really love to feel confident in taking good pictures of other peoples kids or couples or whatever. One day having a nice studio??? Never can tell right???? Anyhow, my plan is to blog about this class,.... it's a 3mo long class,... with 10 assignments. I will post the photo's that I submit to the teacher and even share with you his grade/comments (if there are any?) Exciting stuff huh???
Well, my first post was much wittier,... which for me is rare,.... but blogger ate it or something :( I will never learn to cut/copy before I try and publish/send something :( Sigh.
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