Application is on holiday break

My original plan was to submit on Dec 15th but decided that finding the extra $50 and the added stress right before Christmas was too much. So the new plan is to submit the GSU app on or around Dec 31st (deadline 1/15). Then the WGU app in late Jan (deadline 2/5).

Over that hump

I asked my boss today to write me a Letter of Recommendation. Crossed that hurdle, so I entered her email as well as my two others into the online app. I dont have any professors to recommend me. I have my sons' special ed teacher, my current boss and a former boss. It will have to do. Hopefully the rest of my app is strong enough to make up for my lack of recent academic references.

Resume and SOP are probably as good as they are going to get. Now its just a matter of uploading them for finality, coughing up the $$ and hitting submit.

Has anybody seen my motivation?

I'm reasonably satisfied with a few small changes to my SOP, but I still plan to sleep on it for awhile and see if I am visited by a muse for more inspiration. The rest of what I have to do, that I find myself procrastinating on:

*Update my resume
*Finalize the 3 people to write Letters of Reference (LOR) and enter their names online app
*Dig up employment history for app
*Find an extra $50 laying around
*Hit submit

I want to ask my new boss for a LOR but I have only been there since Sept and I dont want her to think I am on my way out the door already. I also wanted to have a little more experience under my belt but I know I cant wait forever either.

Regardless, there is no reason why my motivation should have gone *poof* right now. I need to find a way to get my head back in the game. I guess studying for the GRE was very focused energy and the rest of the app is just more self directed and therefore...procrastinatable. (Wont find that word on the GRE)

Or it could just be that this is an area I dont feel as confident in compared to other applicants. Transcripts, GRE scores, essay - I can rock those. Relevent work experience and academic letters of reference? Not so much.

Statement of Purpose - Second attempt

Feel free to critique, edit and/or shred to bits...

Parenting a special needs child was not one of the things I factored in when deciding on a final undergraduate major. At the time, I chose Business Management due to the flexibility and seemingly open-ended career prospects it offered. I did thrive for several years after graduation, working in both the private and government sector as a database report specialist. My sons’ special needs were apparent early on and by the time he was officially diagnosed with Aspergers Syndrome at age 4, I choose to leave full time work to support him as he navigated the world of school, therapies and social relationships. As he has grown, I am now in the position to re-evaluate my priorities and pick, for a second time, what I want to be when I grow up.

I have always had an interest in science and biology, which is why I started my college career as a Biological Sciences major. Communication Disorders, as a path to becoming a Speech Language Pathologist, offers me the opportunity to study the physiology of communication while also building on my desire to help children maximize their potential. Having sat on the other side of the table at IEP meetings, speech evaluations and therapy sessions, I bring compassion and understanding to the arena that will only benefit my work with future clients and their families.

My primary interest is working in a school setting, but I value the Georgia State Communications Disorders program because of its well rounded emphasis on all facets of clinical SLP experience, which will allow me to make a fully informed career choice upon graduation. Regardless of the location of my future career (school, hospital or private practice) I do feel a particular calling to working within the autism community, specifically with social skills development. My son and I were fortunate enough to be involved with a camp that teamed special needs children with neurotypical high school aged “buddies” and it was an amazing, life changing event for both sets of young people. I envision that the knowledge and experience gained from completing my Masters in Communication Disorders, built upon my business background, will allow me to help establish additional camps like this and make them accessible to more families in need.

While it’s been many years since I have enrolled in an academic program, I am sure you will find that my work and volunteer experience demonstrates my willingness to learn new things, jump in where needed and successfully complete the project at hand. I thank you for reviewing my application and look forward to the opportunity to meet the admission committee in person.

It's currently 440 words, limit is 500. The guidelines are: A 300-500 word statement of your professional/career goals completed on the online application. This is your opportunity to explain how your career and educational goals are compatible with those of the program to which you are applying.

It's over

Thank God. I no longer have to spend every waking moment studying. Now I just need to spend every waking moment worrying about my SOP.

I am very happy with my scores. All the studying and practice definitely paid off.

V: 640
Q: 720

Cram Night!

Well tomorrow is it. I take the GRE at 1pm and hopefully I will score well enough to put all of this study nonsense behind me forever. I likely wont get much done in the morning, since I will have the girls and am also interviewing a potential new on-call babysitter, so tonight is it.

Silly me, I just noticed the "Practice Questions" section of Powerprep. Previously, I had just gone straight to the practice tests. So I will try to slog through all 6 math sections tonight. I worked through all the antonym and word association sections already. I dont really think I need to work on sentence completion (got 10/10 on the one I did) and reading comp. Brain is way too addled to mess with long, boring text passages.

I would like to write 1-2 more essays, but with a broken A key, its very frustrating to type on my keyboard. So I'll just read a bunch of samples tonight.

Still sick. Still teetering on the edge of getting better or worse. Hoping all the vitamins and supplements I am taking will hold this virus at bay for 20 more hours. Then I can collapse into a wilted heap of sickness.

Consistency

Coming down to the wire. Took just the Verbal and Quant of my last Powerprep practice test and got the same overall score, just a 10 pt shift on each section.

V 620
Q 660

Hopefully that consistency carries over to a similar score on test day.

I worry about my vocab. When I run into a math problem I don't know, I can usually noodle it out and come to an understanding. When I see a vocab word I don't know, I try to memorize it. I have lists I have been working from. But unfortunately, I find that when I run into that word again, I cant recall it. I guess I just don't do rote memorization as well as I used to. If something comes with a "problem" and an "explanation" I do just fine remembering it.

This worries me just a bit, as I am sure I will have lots of anatomy and such to memorize for my program. I hope its just that those words will have meaning and value vs random words that I may never use again like upbraid, piscivorous or zephyr.

(to scold, fish eating and a light breeze...hmm in a sentence: I ignored his upbraid and concentrated on the zephyr while he ranted about my sloppy piscivorous ways.)

3 days to go. Still hoping this head cold gets better by Weds.