EXCITEMENT

With a capital X!!! Well capital everything. I'm that excited. And once I explain you'll think I'm nerdy to get this excited, but whatev I am. So here's the deal, my life plan if you will. I am in school now to get my Ph.D. *insert short divertion here* Today I officially became a graduate student. What I was before this point in time, I have no idea, so we'll skip that part. But today. Today was orientation, and while the information contained was completely useless to one who has been her for two months, I got a free honey baked ham sandwich out of the deal. The result however is the same, I am now a grad student. I am now free to make fun of undergrads! Now, back to the part about my life plan. After getting my Ph.D. I would really love to become a teacher. That's my goal and I've sort of set things up to make that happen. I went to a school that puts out a lot of teachers, and I told my former teachers at ASU that it was their job to give me a job when I graduated. We'll see how that last part works out. But because of that I have also planned many fun things to help me be a teacher, such as classes on teaching. Now to the EXCITING part. Yesterday I was called by my professor asking to meet with me urgently. So, fearing for my life, I went to his office where he told me that I was going to be considered for a fellowship if I wanted. Today I was told by the director of the fellowship program that it was almost guaranteed that I got the fellowship. This fellowship is called the GAANN (graduate assistance in areas of national need) and is from the Department of Education. So it is only for Ph.D. students who plan on becoming faculty members (Me!). Here are the requirements of the award:
*I have to get good grades and progress towards graduation (great, great plan, already on my list of things to do)
*I have to take ENGR 580 - Teaching Engineering (already listed on my plan of study as a class I wanted to take, listed 6 weeks ago actually)
*Be a Graduate Student Instructor (awesome, I'd actually get to teach and wanted to do this)
*Take teaching workshops at least once a semester (didn't know these existed but awesome!)
*Create a teaching portfolio (would have needed to do this for any job application anyway...so now it will just be better because I'll have help.)

So basically, I get a really prestigious award that I can put on my resume proving that I wanted to be a teacher long before I graduated and had little other options. I get to not only do the things I was planning to do, they are now mandatory and will be facilitated greatly because of it. And I get help achieving those things. Honestly I couldn't have worked this out more perfectly if I had tried and I'm really so excited! Plus I get to save my prof a year's worth of money which puts me in his good graces at least for a little while :)! So there we go, haha I'm excited because my life plan is actually working out really well so far. I knew there was a reason I loved it here!


***UPDATE: two seconds after posting this I checked my email and there was the official letter saying I have been awarded this fellowship!***