On the Eve of Graduation...

At this time tomorrow evening, I will be in the middle of graduation. Yikes!!! There is still so much to do, but luckily, I think I will survive - and hopefully, graduation will go well...I found myself wondering why I ever thought I could handle planning graduation (and why anyone ever agreed to let me plan it when I have no idea what I am doing!). Sigh. Regardless of how qualified I am to plan this event, I am in charge of it, and at least it will soon be over.

Despite the stress it is adding to my week, I am really excited about graduation. I am so proud of my students and they deserve a chance to celebrate with their friends and families.

Last week we had an all-day GED test and four of the thirteen students we sent passed the test. The test was on Thursday, so I wasn't really expecting scores to be posted until Monday, but right before leaving work on Friday I checked my e-mail and had an e-mail from the GED site saying that my scores had been posted. At first, I was confused; but then I remembered that in the fall I had signed one of my students up for the test using my e-mail address since she didn't have one...

Here's a little backstory...This student is a participant in CAP's Healing Rain program (substance abuse recovery). When she took the GED test in October, she passed in every area but math - and she only missed it by two questions. Since then, she had not really pursued studying too much; I think she was really discouraged and felt like she would never get it. Anyway, when we found out we were closing and that we would have this one last GED test I called her and asked her to come up and try for it. So she came and we gave her an OPT (official practice test), but she didn't have the right score. So we gave her another one. She missed it again. We had one last try (there is a silly rule that you can only give the OPT three times in a year) on the morning that we had to send the list of students who were testing in, and thankfully, she made it!

...The e-mail said that my scores were posted online, so I quickly got on the site to look up the score. I cannot tell you all how excited I was when I saw that she had passed!!! I think I may have even yelled...It worked out great too, because I still needed to give her her graduation invitation. I went to Healing Rain and was able to give her the news in person. She was totally shocked! I guess when she heard I was there to see her she thought I had come to tell her she had failed - needless to say, she was excited that I came to tell her the opposite. I feel so blessed that I was able to be with her; it was an experience that just confirmed why I came here in the first place: I came to serve and to share life with these people, and I am so thankful that I am here.

So I guess you can bring on the stress of graduation - it is worth it. Although if you have any spare prayers, please feel free to send a few my direction tomorrow; I can guarantee I can use them!

And on a side note, there has been another major blessing with my work this week. Monday morning I found out that CAP agreed to allow us to stay open until the end of our contract, which means we will be open until June 30th. We will, however, be operating on a smaller level. We can only keep three staff members and we are moving to a smaller classroom. But thankfully we can still serve our students. Next week will continue to be crazy as we keep packing and moving, but it is nice to know I will be able to stay with Adult Ed until the end of June. And I will still be able to participate in WorkFest too - which is awesome (kind of like the best of both worlds).

I'm sure I will have more to say about that transition later, but for now, I need to go to sleep. I have yet to really kick this cold and have not gotten as much sleep as I would like the last few days. And since tomorrow is going to be a busy day, I figure I can use all the energy I can get.

Peace.