Hi Friends,

As sad as it is, the time has come for me to wrap up a wonderful year of blogging. Having this opportunity to write about my experiences before and during college has been extremely uplifting for me, and I want to thank all of you—the readers—for the support you’ve shown me; I really do appreciate it. So now I’d let take some time to let you know where I’m headed after graduation and give you a final piece of advice.

As some of you may already know I will be graduating this May with a B.A. in English Teaching; but, I won’t officially have my degree until July. You see, I wasn’t very happy with my classes when I was a business major my freshman year in college, and I let that take a toll on  a couple of my grades. I didn’t realize it until last semester, but having to retake a class or two during my first year of college has left me five credits short of earning my degree, which means I’ll be taking summer courses.

It’s not going to be any fun having to take classes during the summer, but it’s something I have to do before I can start graduate school in the fall. Yes, I’m staying in school to earn my M.A.T. in Secondary Education and become a high school English teacher! The great thing about the education program at the university I attend is that it’s only going to take me one more year of schooling before I can officially start teaching. The program also requires me to do a year long, full-time internship to gain lots of experience teaching my own classes. Of course, most of my peers that are enrolled in the same program are going to take graduate courses during the summer so they can focus entirely on their teaching internship in the fall. Unfortunately for me I will still be taking undergraduate courses in the summer, so I have no choice but to pair my internship with my regular classes next semester. It’s certainly going to require a lot of extra time and energy to do both, but that’s the path I chose to walk on. Sure, it’ll be a little bit harder balancing everything throughout the year, but once I have a routine set I know I will do just fine.

The way I see it is we all have setbacks in our lives that can make our goals seem extremely challenging to work through and almost impossible to achieve. Sometimes the setbacks are insignificant, and they barely get in the way of our dreams; and, sometimes the setbacks are so overwhelming that they cause us to give up on our dreams entirely. But I think my setback falls somewhere in the middle. Sure, I have to take a few courses during the summer, and I’ll have to take courses during the fall in the midst of interning full-time, but sometimes feeling the pressure of time is just what I need to keep my priorities straight and keep my life goals on track. I think staying positive is what’s going to get me through this, and I’m really excited to see how much I will be able to accomplish over the next year.

Remember: The obstacles in our lives are never as big as we imagine them to be, and everything really does happen for a reason. At the end of the day the fact that we experience obstacles won’t matter to anyone—everyone has them at one point or another. But it’s how we work to get over those obstacles and achieve our goals, staying positive and working hard, that motivates others to do the same and helps us to believe that anything is possible. So don’t turn a small obstacle in your life—something you can get over with a little bit of hard work and dedication—turn into a wall that you can’t break down. All you have to do is hang on tight to your dreams and believe that you can accomplish anything you set your mind to. Who knows, things might even turn out better than you hope.

Best,
Kendra