After High School, A scary thought to realize is that there is only about 5 months more until the class of 2019 graduates and is left to face the real world. I will soon be a part of the millions of students in the United States graduating and am certain that I’m just as stressed and tired as much as the other future graduates. With less than a year away from the beginning of my future I have tried to plan out the biggest choices of my life. As a person, in general, I tend to panic when life-changing decisions need to be made and I become unsure of my options. This project has required research to be done on my part which has helped me have a better understanding of what I need to do in order to get to where I want to be in the future. Most of my worries are gone because I have narrowed down my college and career options, found how to make it to my reach school, and just how I will budget myself to get through colleges.
I have found from research that I would like to major in psychology and ultimately become a school psychologist. According to “Become a Psychologist: Step by Step Career Guide” a school psychologist should be able to, “Listen to concerns about academic, emotional or social problems; promote positive behaviors, help students process their problems and plan goals, meet with parents and teachers to discuss learning, behavioral, and social problems, study and implement behavioral management techniques” all of these are skills I feel already pertain in my abilities. Being a school psychologist means that I would get to work with school-aged children and young adults (2-18 years old) helping them through the stages of their lives in which the people around them make the most impact to their developing minds.
As summarized in “School Psychologist” to become a school psychologist I will need to get a university-level education starting off with general education, bachelor’s, master’s, and doctorate degree including certification by state the department of education, National Association of School Psychologists (NASP), state licensure, and attend a supervised internship. Some of the required classes I would need to take would be the two years of general education and all psychology courses offered by the college such as PSYCH 199, PSYCH 102, human behavior, social studies, statistics, and English. Other majors related to psychology would be American studies, integrative biology, cognitive science, linguistics, sociology, anthropology, and social welfare. If for any reason being a school psychologist were not to work out, with a psychology degree I’d be able to become a licensed marriage and family psychologist, child psychologist, social worker, or clinical psychologist.
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The United States alone has a lot of great options for universities, especially with prestigious psychology programs that would lead me to a successful future. After researching I found myself with three colleges as possibilities for me to go and further my education. I looked into Fresno State, University of Pennsylvania, and UC Berkeley all very different and similar at the same time. My safety school, Fresno State, located in Fresno CA has psychology as an impacted major and will keep me from leaving my hometown something I want to do for sure. As for my dream school, I chose the University of Pennsylvania, an ivy league school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania which will be kept a dream, because of financial reasons, extreme competitiveness, and high standards. The college I decided to be my best option would be the University of California Berkeley, a fairly small undergraduate student population located in an urban community.
The beautiful campus wasn’t what sold the university, I would say the real commentary from students on their website, “Office of Undergraduate Admissions” about how much of an,“Amazing the school, very intense but fun courses, a great way to get experience, and new people to meet” gave me a feel for the school and convinced me that UC Berkeley was a great school. To be considered into the average 17% that are actually accepted, UC Berkeley requires students to have all A-G courses needed to graduate, recommended English, science, social studies, and statistics. Being that hard to get into UC Berkeley I would like to ask a college admissions counselor what percentage of their graduates found jobs after graduation to pay off what they had invested into their own education/future. The total tuition including housing, utilities, and food and board comes out to $27,006, totaling about $160,203-$216,848 for all of my 6-8 years of education.
Living on campus generally saves a lot of money which is why I will live on campus to budget myself. The work-study program in UC Berkeley is looking for a library assistant for $16 an hour for 16 hours a week and my part-time job will pay the minimum wage $12 an hour for about 20 hours a week, with taxes implemented I would make about $1,845 a month for my expenses. Having done the calculations if I were to live on campus FAFSA, loans, work-study, and a part-time job would help pay for my expenses and leave me with around $100 to spend monthly which is a very tight budget but with the right skills can be managed with and is doable (see attachment 1). If I were to live off-campus I would actually not be able to pay for everything and be in debt of about $273 every month.
Even though I know I would not make it in an off-campus I still did the calculations and found the same payment methods for on-campus would leave me with money left over from Pell Grant and loans, but I would not be able to afford a two-bedroom apartment with a roommate, utilities, health insurance, food, personal, entertainment, and transportation costs (see attachment 2). Of course, I have looked into the turnout for school psychologists in 2017 they made an average of $78,690 working a 40-hour shift with a set routine. This would be enough to help me get by after my schooling and slowly pay any debt that I will be left with from my school loans showing that my schooling and career choice are a good investment for me. A plus with school psychologists would be that they’re off when school is off for major holidays, school breaks, and summer vacations including paid vacation and sick leave. I lack the ability to not stress over things and to avoid procrastination., so I should focus on learning how to manage my stress and to not procrastinate as much.
The reason this is an issue that may delay me in achieving my own goals is that becoming a school psychologist is not simple. After researching this career, I’ve found how rigorous and lengthy the process is to be and I wouldn’t want to say that I lack motivation or am lazy, but that I tend to put things off until the last minute. I want to fix this problem before attending college because I would not want to “risk my own future for procrastinating” (Lombardo). Even though this route that I want to take is a rigorous environment, I want to use my college years as a time to challenge myself and explore this new stage in life. According to the article, “Dealing with Stress – Ten Tips” some ways to help with stress and procrastination were to get someone around me to help me avoid it, make no excuses, commit to my tasks, and have my own agenda organized with goals and deadlines.
An agenda will help me remember any deadlines, events, and things that I would have to get done. For stress, I will avoid procrastination and try to remember to take some time to breathe and take small breaks to recover from any difficult situations I may go through. All of these small things need to be worked on in order to continue my path to a successful future. Most kids my age spend their senior year of high school stressing about what comes afterward, but this senior year capstone project has helped me become more prepared of what is in store for me. The biggest drive in my life, to further my education, has to do with being a first-generation college student, which has motivated me to give it my all and take college seriously. Being given time out of our classes in order to prepare for our future has helped each and every student prepare for life after high school, and has truly given all students a clearer picture of their futures. Although the unknown that comes after high school is a scary thought to think about, I’ve learned that fear limits one’s confidence and determination. As of this moment, I can say I feel the most confident for what my life will look like after graduation.
