My career path has been a long and winding road, but those first four years at MCC really helped me find my way - and eventually find my place. I remember applying for the job frantically, as the deadline was Memorial Day 2001 and I just found out about it a day before. My then wife had just accepted a position as an English instructor at MCC, and as we were ready to move from Illinois to Michigan, I needed a place to work as well. Meijer had just opened their new store in Greenville, and I was looking at being reactivated from my educational leave, which would let me get back to working for them once we got all set; however, a year in the deli in a Robinson, IL grocery store (Buehler's Buy Low) really worked against any desire to work retail at all if it could be helped. That being said, we needed additional income, and I was willing to do whatever it took (that does not seem to be as common anymore - I have heard many people talk about what kind of work or pay they need to take a job). This attitude did serve me pretty well.
I got the application for MCC filled out and faxed in on Memorial Day, and not too long thereafter I was asked if I could come for an interview. I had to drive up from Robinson, IL - and I drove to Bay City, MI, where my mother-in-law lived, spent the night there, then went for the interview the following day. This was in the days before GPS, so I had MapQuested directions (that used to be a verb...), which was sorely needed to find this college in the middle of nowhere. By then, after two years in Robinson, where I earned my Associate Degree at Lincoln Trail College, I was used to being in the middle of nowhere, so that didn't bother me at all - as a matter of fact, I was excited to see something other than soybean fields - and this area even had trees and even some hills and lots of water (I was used to the Wabash river, and that was about it). I had the interview, and then I was asked to do a computer test to see if I had the computer skills they were looking for. That was something I was pretty confident about, as one of my earlier jobs had included teaching basic computer skills to graduate students from developing countries with limited exposure to it (we are talking mid-90s here, so computers weren't as widespread yet).
I did really well at the computer test, and not long after, I was hired, so I must have done ok in the interview as well, despite declaring that I was on a "quest for knowledge." I know, it sounds pompous, but it actually was (and still is) true. I am fascinated by learning new things, and while my words might not have been the best ones to get the point across, they seemed to have worked. I started July 1 2001 in a job that initially was 30 hours per week. Before school started in August that year, they shuffled things around and I was a full time employee. I could say that the rest is history - but that would belie a very important aspect of the job. While a lot of the job had to do with answering the phone for the toll free recruitment line we had at the time and calling for follow-up a week or two after we had sent out the information, what I really enjoyed about the job was working directly with students. My job in that respect was really just to help set up appointments with Jim Lucka, who was one of the two counselors at that time, as well as with our registrar and director of admissions, but I developed a knowledge of our programs that was solid enough to field the most basic questions. I probably went deeper than I should from time to time, and after a while, I started talking to Jim about pursuing a career in counseling.
I completed my bachelor's degree (BA in Family Life Education) at Spring Arbor University in 2004, and Jim had provided me with a lot of information on counseling program. In the end, my experience with SAU had been so positive for my BA that I went back there despite my original plans of attending Central Michigan University (any attempts I had to come visit CMU to talk about the program was pretty much dismissed by them, stating they did most of their work over the phone - I hope that's not the case anymore). Jim's encouragement was there all the way through, which made it more difficult to take a job at Alma College in the summer of 2005, but it was an important step, as I went from support staff to professional staff, from hourly employment to salaried. It was a big deal for me.
However, admissions was not my thing. Don't get me wrong, I did love meeting with and working directly with students. My favorite parts of the year were the orientation sessions for both my transfer students and my international students. People started joking about me having ducklings in tow, especially when it came to international students as they arrived on campus, but I really loved that part of the job. What I didn't like was the salesman aspect of the job. I am not a salesman. I like to think that I am pretty good at working with people with their best interest in mind, but persuading them that this is what they should do was antithetical to where I came from as a counselor - which was rooted in people making their own choices. So when I graduated with my counseling degree in 2007, I couldn't wait to get a counseling job. However, it would take about a year before I was able to get one.
Through my job at Alma College, I got involved in the Articulation Committee in MACRAO (Michigan Association for College Registrars and Admissions Officers), and I had gotten to know Kathleen Owens, who was a counselor at Grand Rapids Community College. I believe I was introduced to her by Jim Lucka as well during the first MACRAO conference I attended in the fall of 2005. When I saw Jim, I really enjoyed seeing a friendly face that I knew - but as I entered the Articulation Pre-Conference Workshop and later the Articulation Committee itself, Kathleen really took me under her wings and helped a very nervous me (I am not sure if that showed outwardly, but it was definitely the case internally) get used to this new environment. This meeting with Kathleen let me towards my next step on my career path, which was my first counseling job.
Every time GRCC had a counseling position open, she forwarded me the information. I applied for my first job there before I had my counseling license - but that didn't work. I got my limited license with Kathleen as my supervising counselor (you have to have 3000 hours counseling experience over 2 years before you become a fully Licenced Professional Counselor (LPC) in the state of Michigan - before that you are a Limited Licensed Professional Counselor (LLPC)), and I applied for another job. This time it was a part time position as a counselor, and I got called in to the interview. I didn't get that position either, but in the phone call telling me that, they wanted to make sure that I had applied for the full time positions that were open. I thought that might be a good sign, and it was. In November 2008 I started working as a counselor at GRCC.
I thought that was it. I loved my job there, and I loved my colleagues. It was great working with a larger group of people - and I could always go to them with questions I might have. Lunchtime was often spent with Kathleen and Fred Zomer, another counselor there I really connected with. Kathleen and Fred had gone through the counseling program at CMU together, and I really felt like I had found my place. So when Jim Lucka announced his retirement in 2009, I didn't apply. I was very content. The next year, in 2010, Charlotte Fokens announced her retirement. She had been my internship supervisor at MCC in my year from hell (I worked my full time job at Alma while also completing the 100 hour practicum and 600 hour internship, running myself completely ragged during the 2006-07 school year), and I knew that this would be my last chance at getting a counseling job at MCC, which really had felt like home to me, so I decided to apply. I didn't like leaving GRCC that quickly, but it was my chance in a lifetime - at least it felt like it - so I when I got the offer, I decided to take the job, and that is a decision I never have regretted.
They say that if you do what you love you will never work a day in your life. That is pure bullshit, because no matter what you do, there will be days that are more challenging than others, and there are days work definitely feels like hard work. However, loving what you do truly makes the drive in every morning a lot easier. I know, because I have had my dream job not just once, but twice. The difference is that now my dream job is with my dream institution. Montcalm Community College may have its flaws here and there, but from the very first day I set foot on campus for my first interview here, it has felt like home. It is home. When my outside life has been turbulent, I always counted on MCC to be a calming factor. Because that is what home really is.
For a song going along with my musings over the past 16 years, I thought that Lee Ranaldo and the Dust had a great song on their Last Night On Earth album from 2013. I have loved Lee Ranaldo's songs from his time with Sonic Youth, where I often appreciated his melodic approach more than the approach of his counterpart, Thurston Moore (although the two of them together was pure magic). Lee Ranaldo had Steve Shelley from Sonic Youth on drums for this project - he seems to be the goto drummer for both Ranaldo and Moore - along with Alan Licht on guitar and Tim Lüntzel on bass. The song Home Chds seems like a perfect meditation over coming home, which is how I feel at MCC.
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