After graduating from Bayport-Blue Point High School in June of 2015, I set my sights on Saint Joseph's College in Patchogue, NY. A place that quite frankly, I received a lot of criticism for even considering attending. Mostly my friends. They were going away for school and thought that staying home was going to be boring and uneventful. However, I loved everything about the school. The small class sizes, the knowledgeable and respectful professors. The campus itself was beautiful. For me, it was a perfect fit. I would be studying Nursing. A major that, looking back on it now, I had no business being in. I majored in Nursing because I knew that Nursing had a lot of job opportunities and that the starting salary upon graduation would be excpetional. Additionally, my mom loved Nursing. She thought it was like the best college major ever! Registered Nurses at this time, much like today, were in very high demand.

I made it two years through the program and not only learned a ton of information, but made lasting friendships and experiences. I was somewhere around a 3.8 GPA which was very respectable. Anatomy and Physiology I and II, Biology, Chemistry, and Statistics were tough classes. But that Spring of my Sophomore Year, I had lost the passion. Gone was the excitement. Gone was the eagerness. Nursing was no longer for me. Although I didn't know it then, I had cheated myself. I had let myself down. I was a very good student throughout high school and college thus far. But, I did not choose my own destiny. I looked at jobs and money instead of passion and enjoyment. You see, I learned that whatever you do to earn a living in this world, you must take some joy in it. If you hear the 6AM alarm clock go off day in and day out to show up for a job in which you hate, you will become miserable.

So, when I decided to switch majors, my mom was not thrilled to say the least. However, I switched to English Adolescence Education. A degree that I would be able to finish in two years and then start looking for a job or applying to graduate schools. I could not be happier. My brother, Brendan, was also an English Adolescence Education major at St. Joe's. We could be study buddies! Well, after a year and a half of that major, I decided that being an English teacher wasn't right for me either. So, I graduated in January of 2019 with a Bachelor of Science in General Studies Magna Cum Laude. A degree that isn't very useful or practical, but hey it's still a degree!. A degree, mind you, that I am very proud of. I'm actually staring at it right now as it sits on the wall above my computer in my bedroom. That Spring of 2019, I enrolled in my Master's degree for School Library Media Specialist at Long Island University. A degree that will allow me to become a New York State certified school librarian by May of 2020. What a wild turn of events!

Four years ago, I made the best decision of my life. The people I was blessed to meet both inside and outside of the classroom, the opportunities I was afforded as a student, and the guidance from my friends and family have made these past four years incredible. In my senior year of high school when I visited Stony Brook University and some of the other larger colleges on Long Island, I didn't feel the same way as I did on the campus of St. Joe's. At St. Joe's, you are not just a number on a class schedule of two-hundred students in a lecture hall. Rather, you are one of twenty very important and unique students in the class. Your voice is heard. Your opinions matter. Overall, I feel like I have made tremendous strides academically, spiritually, and professionally throughout my four years at Saint Joseph's College. In my personal opinion, St. Joe's works on the development of the total person in a way that no other college does. For those reasons, I am and will always be a very proud alumni of Saint Joseph's College. Whatever I am today or become tomorrow, I owe a great deal back to St. Joe's.