Brad Izatt Eng-101
Fay Rouseff-Baker
Mar 7, 2013
Choices of a Lifetime
There have been many different moments in my life where I am forced to make an educated and well thought out choice between two or more things. For example, after high school I needed to decide on whether or not I wanted to play football in college or just be a full time student and work a job. Oddly enough I ended up choosing college football at a private college over attending a junior college this last fall, a choice I soon came to regret. In a short summary of my first college experience, I jumped into a big decision without thinking enough about it and I am now attending Parkland College and working at JT Walker’s a sports bar in Mahomet, Illinois. I give you an example of a hard choice I have had to make in my life recently because in the next couple of semesters at Parkland College I will need to make another tough decision. Even though I have my major picked out already which is Nursing, I still need to decide whether or not I want to discontinue my education after I get my associates degree to be a Registered Nurse, or to continue on with my education and become a Nurse Practitioner. There are many things to consider when choosing a career, even if they are similar occupations it does not always mean they are the same in every aspect of the job. A few of the topics I will be comparing between my current job and the two I just listed in my essay will be location, salary, environment, and responsibilities. Almost everybody who is out of college and working in their career has the one job that they despise more than any other. For me that job just so happens to be at my current place of employment. I have been working at Jt Walkers restaurant and sports bar in Mahomet, Illinois as a bar back since October of 2012. This is not the first time that I have worked at Jt’s, I also worked there my sophomore year after basketball season but then had to quit for football season. There has been a big difference between the first time I worked at Jt’s and the current time and that is what the job entails. When I first worked at this job, my duties were mainly to restock the bar with alcohol or ice or whatever the bartenders needed, bus all the tables, and to bring out food when the waitresses become too swamped with customers to do so. My duties currently entail, restock the bar, bus all tables, bring out all the food to the tables upstairs and down, make the dressings, and to take out the boxes and trashes for the restaurant and in the kitchen at the end of the night. I have no problem with working hard as long as I am going to get paid for what I do compared to what everyone else does in the business. One thing I do not understand is how I take out all of the food for every waitress while all they do is take the order and type it in to the computer yet they get paid twice what I do, but salary is only one link to a great job. Now everything about my job at Jt’s I wouldn’t consider to be bad, one being the location. Since I live in country of Mahomet, I am closer to Fisher, Illinois than I am to Mahomet but it’s better than driving to Champaign for work. Along with location as a plus, I also have a good job environment at Jt Walkers. I love sports and there is always a game on TV while I am working so if the restaurant ever gets very slow and boring I can watch a game for a few minutes. With that being said, I still work at a bar so of course there will always be drunken people present on the weekends mostly. There is nothing more frustrating than having to repeatedly ask a customer to move so you can get by while I have three hot plates in my hands after just walking up a steep flight of stairs. l can say that working at Jt Walkers has taught me a lot about the workplace and restaurants in general; I was very surprised to realize how many people in the world do not have common restaurant courtesy. All in all, working at a job such as my current one I have realized why college is so important and it has given me more motivation than I would ever need to further my education. I have never been the kind of person to just do something to be doing and not have a reason for the hard work that I am putting in. Now that goes along with anything such as in sports where I put hard work in the weight room and doing drills to better myself for when it’s time to perform in the games, that is how I am trying to look at myself as far as college goes. I feel as if most people get so caught up in the little picture of school which is the daily homework or studying and the weekly tests, when they should be looking at college in the big scheme of things. Isn’t the purpose for attending college to better oneself and to get a career with financial support along with benefits that would come with the job? Even though it is hard to not get caught up in the little picture, I just have to snap myself out of it every couple of days and know it will all pay off in the long run. When I first entered college I honestly had no clue what I wanted to be when I grow up as most people over 60 would ask me. I never really had a dream job per say or any one occupation that I could picture myself doing. I asked myself a few questions though before the spring semester started and they were, “What am I interested in at this point in my life?” “How much money do I want to make?” and, “Where do I want to live when I get out of college?” I came up with my answers and I surprised myself with the major I eventually choose, nursing. I honestly never would have thought of becoming a male nurse but the job fits all of my important job qualifications that I would want. A nurse makes a respectable amount of money; the job requires learning and dealing with the human body and with this job I can travel all over the country to work. With every decision comes even more decisions and now that I had chosen a major I would have to decide how far I would want to go into my nursing degree. The three main parts into nursing as far as education goes usually start with getting my associates degree in nursing, which qualifies you to become a RN or Registered Nurse. The next phase would be to get my bachelor’s degree in nursing which is qualifies you to be a BSN, and the last phase is attending a master’s program such as to be a Nurse Practioner or a Nurse Annethisist. I have not yet chosen how far I want to go in my education but I know for sure I will want to at least get my associates in nursing and become a RN. This job meets all of my qualifications as far as wants go but for only a certain point in my life. Usually as a RN working in a hospital setting has to work three 12 hour shifts a week which I think is an amazing job schedule. This would give me an opportunity to have days where you relax or do what I plan on doing which is going to school online to receive my bachelor’s degree while working at the same time. Some of the main duties that entail in a RN’s job are to, “Record patients' medical histories and symptoms, give patients medicines and treatments, and to help perform diagnostic tests and analyze results” (www.bls.gov). A RN makes a median salary of, “$65,500 average per year, $31.50 per hour” (www.bls.gov), and are qualified to work in any state in the United States by taking a test from state to state. All of these aspects of the job are great ones that I look forward to but the only two things I am worried about with being a RN is the salary and the hours as I get older. I wish to make more money in that while I am in my 40’s and 50’s and also would most likely want to work a 8am-5pm shift so I could attend all of my future kids events.
Even though I don’t necessarily enjoy school and all it entails, I do enjoy the outcome that a higher education can bring me. This is one of the reasons why I want to further my education on past an associate’s degree and become a Nurse Practioner. Becoming a Nurse Practioner would let me make the desired amount of money that I wish because a NP makes a median salary of , “$88,500 average per year , $42.50 per hour” (bls.gov). A NP also usually works a pretty normal shift from 8 to 5 every day and is in a higher up management type of position. A good perk to higher education is it usually means that the more I have the more people I will not have to answer to in the workplace.
Unquestionably, I have grown up a lot in this past year in college and have my head a lot more secure on my head then I ever have had in the past. I have chosen a major, I have improved my outlook on life and school in general and I have also improved my social life. I plan to keep improving every aspect of my life with every month that goes by in it. I plan in the future to become a Registered Nurse in a local hospital while still going to school online to further my education. I have not yet decided whether or not to try and get my master’s degree and become a Nurse Practioner, but only time will tell. There is a lot that could happen to me or my family within the next two to three years and those events will tell me what I need to do as far as school goes.
Enclosing, here are a couple of poems that I wrote last summer and it sums up how I looked at life at the point in my life,
“Fully being happy is like a solar eclipse it seems. It will show up when you’re not expecting it, you’ll get mesmerized by its glow and then it’ll be gone before you’re ready to let it go.” “The heart is like an army of a million men, strong and trained to take on whatever is thrown its way, but just like an army, the heart can be crushed in a blink of an eye.” I still believe in these words to a certain point but it shows how just changing the way you look at school will change your outlook on life. All of the goals I mentioned in my paper that I will accomplish were never even a thought in my mind a year ago. With education comes opportunity.