<p>Hey, </p>
<p>I am here to ask some opinions about college when having to juggle having family obligations and having a learning disability. First I would like to talk about my family obligation. I take of my father, who is bed bound, with my mother and have to handle going to school part time, which is fine with me. But thats it on that part. My issue is that when I was in public school my whole life I have been in special ed. I felt that I was not challenged enough to reach my full potential. All I know about my learning disability is that it is dyslexia and have a speech problem. But before I finished high school, I was told that I was unable to obtain a college education or a degree and they would not give me a more detail on what learning disability(I supposedly had another one) I had (I have learned to deal with my dyslexia and does not effect me as bad as before) because of my LD by some of the special education advisors, teachers, and councilor. Don't get me wrong, there were many who supported me on my thrive to get an education, but there was that little voice of doubt in the back of my head. As of now, I am at a community college and felt that my public education cheated me wrong and not preparing me. I have a 2.5 GPA, and my first few semesters I had a 3.0. I am proud how much I have accomplished, and I want to set a new goal is to gain a masters degree or PHD. The majors I have passion in are Anthropology and Biology, it is very difficult to decide for me. </p>
<p>The reason I gave you a brief story of my life is because I want to know if it is possible for someone with a learning disability to gain a masters or Phd. I feel that it is my goal in life to prove people wrong that I can learn and do things that I would be satisfied in life. College to me is like a proving ground and that it helps me prove that I am able to do this and that education is important to me. In my high school days, I would be treated differently and would make me irritated in so many levels. I love learning, that is really all. I really want to go to a respected school that I can be proud to be apart of, schools I really want to go is University of California, San Diego. On my behalf, I will be at this community college for about another 3 years (Been here for about 1.5 years)I want to apologies on the grammar errors and using "I" way to many times. Just rambling on and killing time until my professor post the assignments on the school site. </p>
<p>You absolutely should keep working towards going to more college and getting advanced degrees. </p>
<p>The other part of this equation is are you trying to obtain advanced degrees to get a better job, or just for the love of learning? If it’s just love of learning, I would just read and take classes here and there because it would be cheaper. But if you want a better job, then by all means do the university path. But also, I would check out what career paths are competitive (meaning lots of people want to go into it, but there aren’t many jobs available) and which career paths are likely to lead to a definite job. We’ve been steering our college-aged son toward looking at the information on the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (<a href=“http://www.bls.gov”>www.bls.gov</a>) and searching for the types of careers he might be interested in pursuing. There’s are statistics in the Occupational Outlook Handbook that talk about the Job Outlook, meaning the percentage of growth for that career (whether it is going to grow faster or slower than the average, which tells you if there’s a need for more people going into that career or not) and the median pay, etc. Lots of good information. For instance, my son would love to go into psychology, but TONS of college kids major in psychology, and there isn’t a great need for psychologists in the future because the field is flooded. On the other hand, another interest he has is statistics – and that field is wide open and there is a great need for more people entering the field.</p>
<p>Also, given your life situation where you are the caretaker, there may be scholarships available to someone with your background. You should try talking to the university of your choice and asking for some help with a path to getting you there – what your grade requirements should be, which classes you should take, etc.</p>
<p>As far as your dyslexia, we have just discovered through the disability office at my son’s future college a type of software called Kurzweil 3000 that helps people with slower reading speeds or difficulty with reading – in that it combines a visual on a computer with highlighting of each word – and at the same time, audio that reads the text at the same time. This software is provided by the university, and you could be eligible for a free download through the disability office. It really could be a worthwhile thing, and you could use it NOW and it may help your GPA improve, thereby helping you to get in to someplace like Univ. of Cal. at San Diego. Check the software out at <a href=“http://www.kurzweiledu.com”>www.kurzweiledu.com</a>.</p>
<p>Hope this helps a little!</p>
<p>I thank you so much for replying. I get very embarrassed with telling people about having a LD, and this is one way I guess is me ‘coming out of the closet’ with my LD. The college I am at right now is going to re-test me to find out what category I fall under. I thank you for reading my post, I re-read it and was wondering were I was going. But for the career part. I want to have passion in my job, and those are right now are Biology and Anthropology. I do just for fun is computer programming, would not major in Computer Science, because all the assembly languages programming and things in that matter. I know there are jobs in Biology (depends on the specialization) and Anthropology is still an iffy career choice. My thing is I love learning about evolution and about ancient civilizations and how they function in there society. Thank you for the reply, and you have a lovely day.</p>