Oh my, how things turn out...
I've been nearing the finish line on my Computer Science Bachelor's Degree at Southeastern Louisiana University for some time. Last October, I was led to believe I couldn't graduate in Fall '10 as I expected. This is how it went down as briefly as possible:
I register for Fall '10 commencement. Then I get this strange e-mail from some lady in the department office asking about some classes that I've missed. Basically, how it ends up is that I've got all these people telling me that the substitute courses for the required curricula didn't work so that means I have to go back and take two Freshman Englishes, a Visual Basic programming course, and public speaking. So all of a sudden, I go from graduating to having to delay until Spring '11 so I can tack on another 12 hours/credits. Fantastic! I was as angry as Hitler at that point.
So no use crying anymore. I talk with some people to pull the plug on my Fall graduation. Then I go ahead and schedule public speaking in a nearby off-campus site as well as three online courses, thereby making this surprise semester as stress-free as possible.
In December, I end up planning for that English Composition CLEP exam. Basically, lay down $100 and take a test so you can prove you know Freshman English. I take that damn test and from a range of 20 to 80, my score is 61 (need a 50 to pass). I received this score in the mail a week ago and this I was pretty happy about. I don't claim to know English well, but that's enough to get credit. So at this point, I assumed that my Spring '11 schedule would get a little lighter--go from 12 to 6-9 credits left (depending on how generous the dean's office was).
So yesterday (Wednesday) me and my dad get in the car and drive up to campus and we have to give them my CLEP exam results so they can sign off on it. The lady in the office goes up to the computer and is bewildered...I already have the credits to graduate, she said. So why would I need to tack on extra English credits when I didn't need them?
To end it, I run back and forth between these offices and they do all this checking for me and they confirm that I actually have enough credits before the Spring '11 semester. They slip me all these sheets of paper saying that the course substitutions I once thought were illegitimate were suddenly ratified. I just got this blank look all over me. They deceived me this whole time...
As of right now, I am a college graduate with a Bachelor's degree in Computer Science.
My God, I never thought this day would come. Step 1, graduate from high school. Step 2, graduate from college. Step 3, graduate from another college...the list goes on.
What must've happened is that the people in the office didn't check my entire record and assumed I was missing stuff. Then later, they read that piece of paper and say "oh, so he is done with college," but they didn't tell me. By then, I had already canceled graduation and moved on to the next semester, so it was too late. I just didn't find out until January. Oh, you IDIOTS!!!!!
But that doesn't mean my tenure with Southeastern is over. I still have to obtain my 3.922 GPA diploma. I have until tomorrow to pick one of two options. I'm talking it over with my family:
1. Mail me the diploma, write "Fall '10" on it, cya later, never have to speak to them again.
2. Register for graduation commencement. Pay more money now, wait until May, then they give me the diploma with "Spring '11" it.
So, what now? Well, it's a bittersweet victory. It's good because I don't have any classes this semester. It's bad because I can't just jump into video game graduate school since it's too late for that now. So from now to Summer, I'm sitting here idle. Way to delay the Daytona crusade even more now, people. I must find a short-term job, but what would I do?
Maybe this was a good thing. I wasn't adequately prepared to graduate in December then take off for some school I hadn't applied to in January. I was thinking about going to Full Sail in Florida for my Master's in Game Design. It's close to where I live.
http://www.fullsail.edu/
Until then, I really don't know what to say. You'd think I'd either celebrate or punch a baby, but I'm cool about it. I'm probably gonna play some Call of Duty and just sleep for now. Will get to Sega stuff later.
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