My family certainly wasn't one to deny that education was important. They just never stressed the fact that it was. I will be the first person in my family to have a college degree. (I think I may have one cousin on my dad's side to graduate from college....maybe) My dad has been a coal miner for all of my life and most of his. Although my dad is very intelligent I really never asked for help from him or my mom. My mom stayed home with my sister and I (until the divorce). I don't remember her ever helping me with my school work or even talking about it. I do remember one thing about my dad helping my sister. He was trying to teach my sister how to tell time. She just couldn't get it! I did though. I think I was like four. I remember his frustration, and mine after hearing him tell her a hundred times. I finally caught on and tried to teach her myself. I think the same thing happened when he tried to teach her to tie her shoes. Anyway, my parents really didn't stress the importance of an education. I just did what everyone else was doing at the time of the ACT's. I took it because everyone else did. I certainly didn't stress because I didn't get the importance of it. I went on to college like everyone else.The only thing I didn't do was keep going.

I have since discovered the importance of an education. I intend to pass this new found attitude on to my children. I think now I can look back and see how the difference might have impacted my life. Now I do things alot differently. I study hard and think about the outcome of my determination. I am glad that, somewhere in the heavens, someone was looking out for me and guided me. Otherwise I may not be where I am today. I could have been somewhere struggling to make ends meet. Instead, fate (most likely...GOD) lead me here.

Michelle

How ironic Mrs. McComas- I too wanted to become a medical technologist! I even went so far as to go to a vocational-technical school my junior and senior years of high school for that. I had to find something to do for the second half of the day (since I needed nothing else to graduate) at school. I didn't know that I really wanted to do that for sure, but that is what I decided once I had spent some time with the class. I had planned on getting an associates degree and then going on to college to finish up. Anyway to make it a short story I soon found out I didn't like it. Once I was actually put to work (Logan general hospital) for clinicals. I thought it was boring. I switched my major quickly to (get this....) criminal justice. I wanted to be a PI!!! (LOL) Oh gosh stop me I am still laughing!
Anyway, after many twists and turns of life, I ended up in a small rural town in Boone county. I enrolled my daughter in pre-school at the elementary school. Soon I was room mom and loving every minute of it. One child in particular kept my attention. Sadly, not many others paid him any attention. The reason none of the kids would play with him or interact in any way was because they couldn't understand a thing he said. He was barely intelligible. Every word came out like a grunt (or something like that). I talked to the teacher about him and she said that the school did have an SLP that visited on Thursdays. Unfortunately he was't enrolled. His mother failed time and time again to sign the consent form. He was disruptive continually in the class, and refused many activities. I know that his speech impairment was the cause, because he was very smart . He was a poor helpless child that I needed and wanted so badly to help. That is how I knew I wanted to become a Speech Pathologist.
Michelle