I'm Done

I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. After four and a half years, I am finally done with my masters degree. This has been such a long road. I never imagined how much time and effort this would take.

Because my undergrad work was in Linguistics, I did not have any of the needed prerequisites for a business degree so the first 2 years were spent just completing all the pre work. During that time I took a statistics class. At the beginning of that quarter my beloved Grandpa got sick and near the end of that quarter he died. So needless to say I was pretty distracted that quarter.

Once I finally got into the program, the first class I took was statistics. During that same quarter I started a new job in a new department. The department itself was brand new and we were rolling out our new logistics system. We did this starting on the east coast which meant 4am wake up calls and long hours. (6am is seriously pushing it for me.) Now remember that I was distracted during my foundation statistics course so I had a shaky start to begin with and then I was sleep deprived. And the result was academic probation. What a nasty start to grad school.

It finally came time for me to wrap things up. In the past my school has required graduating students to compile a portfolio of their best work over a wide scope of subjects and styles. Summer was the first quarter that they went to the case study format. Summer quarter they used one company to do a case study on doing a comprehensive analysis. Fall quarter they choose to do building a statistical model as the case study. And oh luck me, that is where I fell into the timeline. Yup, it had all come full circle. I was scheduled to graduate in early December. While I had received passing grades in my prior statistics classes, I had really struggled. I had no idea what I was doing this fall but I researched and worked and worked. But my best was not good enough. In November I was told that I was not graduating. Ooooo nelly I was not happy. I knew my best was not good enough but that didn't change the fact that I was not happy. In fact, out of 10 of us scheduled to graduate that quarter, 3 others were given this same news. One such person I had worked with several times before and I know is a really good student. If this guy couldn't pass, there was a serious problem. The good news is that I was not told that was it or that I had to start over, just that the timeline was going to be later than expected.

A few weeks ago I finally got the okay to move forward. The final step was to present my case study to a panel of professors. At 2:30pm I arrived at school. The appointment was not until 3:00pm but I was not taking any chances of being late. I made my presentation. Then they asked me questions for a while. At 3:54 I was asked to step out into the hallway while they decided my fate. I could see a clock from where I sat. 5 minutes passed and I got a little nervous thinking how long can it possibly take to decide if I did well. 10 minutes passed and I got really nervous thinking they must be having a significant debate or they have decided that I have not passed and they are trying to decide what to tell me. 15 minutes passed and my professor came out into the hallway and said "congratulations". She then said "we got to talking and then said oh she must be out there wondering". Ummm..... YOU THINK!?!?!?!?

The point is that I can finally say I have a Masters in Business Administration.