02/05/2021
Have you ever had to drop out of your studies?
Read this …
Through my ethnographic studies I have learned that there is so much we can learn from our own reflections on our experiences; as well as, from the reflections of other people who had similar experiences. Now that I am a post graduate study leader, I encourage my students to reflect and read the reflections of other people. Here is one of my reflections:
Typical the independent and driven person that I am, I could not go into motherhood and just enjoy it. As soon as my maternity leave commenced - shortly before the birth of our first daughter - I enrolled for a B.Ed. degree with UNISA. Am I hearing mothers laughing in the background? 😉
Probably since I taught – Physical Science and ballet – until 10 days before her birth, my eldest daughter was a colicky baby who slept as little as possible … or so it felt. Now I have always been able to do fairly well on 4 hours of sleep and during post-graduate studies I have often used 2 nights a week for study, but with a new-born baby in the house my responsibilities soon overtook my energy capacity and four months into the process I had to wave goodbye to my studies.
At the time I did not reflect on the process. Sherbet, I hardly had enough brain capacity left to make dinner! But in later years I did and went from feeling like a loser for dropping out to accepting that it was the right thing to do at the time to changing direction and completing four other post graduate degrees.
My Learning:
If I swept the feeling of failure for not completing that B.Ed. it could easily have become a chip on my shoulder and prevented me from continuing my studies later on in life. Critical reflection of the process assisted me in realising that circumstances play and important role in success.
I did not fail because I was lazy or incompetent or … I dropped out because I had to choose between neglecting my baby or neglecting my further education. Hence, when my children were older I pursued my post-graduate studies with success again.
Not completing that B.Ed. provided me with an opportunity to learn.
What did you learn from your experiences that may benefit other people? If you feel brave enough to share, please do so here.
Thank you.