2010 Year in Review

I have not blogged for a really, really, long time. Being in a bishopric, working full time, going to grad school after work, and just living has sucked away pretty much any free time I had before. But seeing that I am on Christmas break, I thought this would be a good opportunity to tell everyone about my year.

Last summer I started grad school. Back in November of 2009, I got accepted to a master of library science program at Clarion University in Pennsylvania. I was pretty excited about this program because it is totally online and there are no residency requirements. What do I mean by residency requirement? Well, some online programs offered through state universities have a residency requirement. Generally this means you go to the school's campus for a couple of weeks during the summer and go through some orientations. Clarion was a very attractive choice because it didn't have this sort of thing as part of the program making it a very attractive choice. Another bonus for Clarion was that they accepted the Miller's Analogy Test as opposed to the dread GRE. Because I did really well on the Miller's and not so well on the GRE, Clarion was second choice behind the University of Alabama. Well, choosing a school was easy because I got accepted to Clarion and did not get accepted to Alabama so by simple process of elimination I chose Clarion.

So far I have completed three classes. The classes I completed are cataloging and classification, collection development, and, favorite class so far, introduction to social research. Next semester I am going to take two classes, can't remember what they are at the moment, but I am confident I will enjoy them just as much as I have enjoyed by other classes.

Grad school has been a great experience. Education and the pursuit of knowledge is a noble endeavor and whether you do it through a university program or self educate with a library card and a hunger for knowledge you are undertaking something noble and your life will be enriched as a result.

Last October marked one year as a member of a bishopric. For those who don't know local Mormon congregations, called wards, have three men who serve as leaders for the congregation. Right now I am the second counselor to our bishop and another man from our ward serves as the first. There are times when it requires lots of time and attention but overall it has been a very good experience. I don't think anyone should seek out this kind of think, I know I did not, but if something like this comes your way it could turn out to be a very good thing.

Work has had some ups and downs. Last summer I transfered from teaching on the children's unit at the Utah State Hospital to teaching on the girls' unit. That was quite the adjustment and I will get to go through yet another one as I temporarily make a switch to working on the boys unit. The reason for the temporary change is that so many girls have gotten discharged in the past couple of weeks that there are not enough students to justify having two classrooms for girls. So, our principle decided that I will work with boys until the numbers on girls come back up. I liked working girls, am looking to working with boys, but I am looking forward to getting the girls back (the boys don't have the best hygiene and so they really smell).

Well, that's about it from me. I guess that I will post again in about eleven months.

Chris