Poll: If you could do it all over again ...

... would you choose the same school you graduated from?

 

For which degree?

 

I would be in a different place

I would not choose my current online school. I would not even be going to school online, I would be attending a B&M school earning my degree in equine studies. I would have been a riding instructor and horse trainer by now.
Maybe I still can be, someday.
Patricia

 

For my undergrad degree, yes. However, I would have pursued the degree I really wanted instead of Liberal Studies. I am extremely happy with my graduate school and degree choice.

 

It is so hard to say since the masters degree has served me so well and has provided me with the opportunity to teach online and earn a lot of extra cash. I have often wished I would have gotten my MBA from Jacksonville University (not Jacksonville State University) instead of an MS-ITM from TUI. I guess the only one I would change would be a PhD from USF as opposed to NCU but that would not be possible since I travel. Short answer - I would not change anything since everything I have done in the past has put me where I am today and I am in a happy place!

 

Change schools? No. Change undergrad major? Yes.

 

I really loved North Carolina Wesleyan. Great school, small classes, great campus. I really thought about transferring to the University of North Carolina, but I was afraid I would lose credits. North Carolina Central University was amazing. Loved the school, the atmosphere, the grind, the crunch-crunch of folks working on their research and making a difference in their fields of research.

 

I would have studied geology instead of engineering.

 

Having barely graduated high school (either 194th in a class of 206 or perhaps GPA = 1.94, not sure which), a prestigious (or even moderately competitive) undergrad was out of the question. Having dropped out of the University of Colorado Boulder's MA program in Mediaeval History with a 1.94 GPA five years prior to enrolling in my MBA program, a prestigious (or even moderately competitive) MBA was out of the question. I liked my undergraduate schools, Mesa State College and Western State College; at that time in my life, I was a bit afraid of large impersonal universities. I chose City University for my MBA program because it was the only program in the Greater Seattle area with an Entrepreneurship track. So, I'm reasonably happy with my alma maters.

 

If I have a choice to start all over, then I would choose a different school and different major. Especially preparing for law school or medical school. I am 26 now, and too old to attend B&M school for an undergraduate degree.

 

No, though I would have focused in economics instead of marketing and possibly double majored at Auburn.
My MBA program was great but I sometimes wonder what would have happened had I gone to some of the other programs I was admitted to, but I think that is normal.

 

Yup, would do it all over again. Looking back, some decisions were pure luck.

If I could do it all over again, I'd pay more attention in some of the classes I took - who knew that stuff would turn out useful?

 

I'm with airtorn. Same schools (Reed, Berkeley, Michigan State), but different major. I changed my major five times at Reed, before I found the one I really liked. Physics to physics-math to math to pre-med to psychology.

 

Not to thread-jack, but when I lived in the dorms at NC State's Lee Hall in the early 1990's, there was a guy who was in his late 20's (I'm pretty sure he was 28) who lived on-campus and had weekend visitation with his child from a previous marriage in the dorm. 26 is older than most B&M undergrad students, but certainly not too old.

 

If I knew about the CLEP tests and testing "out of college" I would have gotten my GED as a junior in high school or earlier, taken some CLEP tests, studied abroad, gotten a BA in Liberal Studies with emphasis in foreign languages from one of the big threes. I definitely would have kept my Masters degree in the same area, but I would have immediately started after undergrad. I then would have IMMEDIATELY started my Ph.D. right after. Now that I am working, it is so hard to go back. I really wish I could get another BA in French and Portuguese. . we'll see. I'm in another Masters degree that I love right now, so I am thinking I will go onto the doctorate and then maybe finish my other bachelors degree later. Yes, it's a little backwards but it's just one of those things .. .

 

If I could do it all over again, I would unequivocally not pursue a doctorate because it's much too hard to achieve. However, now that I have it, I'm extremely satisfied.

In retrospect, I frankly can't believe that I've achieved so much. I barely passed high school. Went to community college for losers. Then took another 21 years to get a four-year bachelors degree. Then whizzed through a Masters at the state university. Then got all choked up in a dissertation in a doctoral program (but still made it). It's frankly unbelievable. I was a driven man. Where did the energy come from? Where did the drive come from? More importantly, where did it go?

 

What context? Hillel vs. Shammai... Keynesian vs. Monetarist... personality psychology vs. social psychology... Coke vs. Pepsi... foon or spork...?

 

If I had to start over, I would have pulled my head from my @#$ and finished my BS degree at PSU way back when I started out of high school instead of graduating from Excelsior.

That said, I wouldn't want to do it differently, however. The fact that I did poorly at Penn State, dropped out and moved to the west coast for work in the internet industry changed my life in ways I could have never imagined.

 

Wow. Never thought I'd hear an Ivy grad say they wish they had dropped out of high school...

 

If I had it to do over again I would have dropped out of HS at age 16 and gotten a GED, then pretty much gone right into college, online or otherwise if at all possible. The last 2 years of high school were a total waste of time. They were neither productive nor enjoyable.

As for the schools, I think if it hadn't been for the ease and accessibility of Ashworth College I likely would never have completed my AS. That being said, if I didn't get my AS from Ashworth it's unlikely I would have gotten my BS from Southwestern which to this day is still one of the highlights of my life. I probably in retrospect would not have enrolled in St. Joseph's College of Maine (giant waste of $1,400) or Western New Mexico University (giant waste of $1,000) and I was totally happy with Ashford U. which I think is a large reason I was able to transition out of law enforcement (harder than it sounds). So far I'm digging Bellevue so even though I've bounced around a bit and taken some hits, overall I think everything has turned out great.

That's a long winded way of saying "no, I don't think I would change where I graduated from" but "yes, I would change a few of my enrollment choices".

...and maybe I should have minored in Business at the BS level, but I'm not sure it was an option back then...