A Long Look Back by the Editor-in-Chief
By Daniel Dow | Editor-in-Chief
My journey started at Mount Wachusett at the height of the pandemic after leaving a 10-year career, with a GPA of 1.8, and on academic probation. I will transfer in the fall to the University of Wisconsin-Superior as I start my own business as a copywriter and editor, a GPA over 3.0, and as a member of the TRIO program. My return in 2021 could not have been a more different experience, and as I leave the Mount to attend my transfer school, I know I will miss the community I found.
My first educational pursuit in 2009 may not have brought me “educational success,” but it was still a learning lesson. I lacked a support structure, motivation, and goals. I learned from my failures that to succeed, you need to set yourself up for success. Without structure and motivation, an individual is going to have a much harder time achieving their goals. And if one does not have goals, then it can be hard to find motivation and to build structure.
Although I knew that I needed a support structure, motivation, and goals when I returned to school, this did not come instantly. It took me a lot of readjusting after being out of school for thirteen years and learning to manage a schedule around my son, who is now a year old, and my daughter, who is now three. But once I found my “groove,” I never felt more at home in my educational pursuits.
What I found as started to become more involved at Mount Wachusett, the thing that helped me find my “groove,” was a sense of community. As a distance learning student, the uniqueness of the Mount Wachusett community did not register at first; I did not realize what made the school so special.
In my second semester, I met with campus president James Vander Hooven while writing a piece for Journalism II about the effects of COVID-19 on the MWCC campus. In that interview he shared one of his biggest struggles was “not being with students” and he followed this up by stating, “I don’t want to normalize all of this [online learning]; I want to bring back what makes us a community college.”
After hearing this and mulling it over for a bit, I realized I was missing something. That I needed to connect with the community and spend more time on campus to find what I was missing. This is when I met Professor Conn and Valois while writing an article about their Beyond Vikings and Volcanoes courseand learned they were not only trying to put together a class that includes an opportunity for students to travel to Iceland but that they were also trying to find funding to cover student’s travel expenses.
They have since found this funding and I am excited to follow their inaugural course.
One of my motivators while pursuing a degree in professional writing is the passion I found for The Mount Observer in my Journalism I course–a class recommended by my advisor during my first semester. The guidance I received from Professor Sue Goldstein quickly altered any doubts about my ability to succeed as a student. She has been an incredible mentor to me as I elevated my way to managing editor of The Mount Observer. I will miss meeting with her monthly (Tom and my editorial team as well) for feedback on the latest issue and I feel truly blessed to have been able to work with her as she plans to retire at the end of this semester.
I was struck with a moment of clarity while working on my Beyond Vikings and Volcanoes article, or beat as we call it in the Journalism field. After leaving the interview with Professor Conn and Valois, I learned that the passion that Professor Goldstein has for her students is not just unique to her but a passion that is truly shared amongst many other faculty and administrators at the Mount. That these teachers are willing to go the extra mile and then some for their students.
There are so many other experiences that I could share and so many faculty and administrators that have inspired or motivated me. There may have been a disruption in the Mount Wachusett community, but I know that the Mount Wachusett spirit is still there. The professors and administrators live it daily, and I know it is only a matter of time before the school returns to the community it once was.
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