Serene of the Oakland Serenes

Home from San Diego. Best and most peaceful visit ever, but that doesn't mean I'm not utterly thrilled to be home, especially after driving all day to get here. I drove probably 1200 miles this week. I'm so over it.

Mom is well. Dad is well. Out-laws and outlaw niblings are well. San Diego is a great place to be from. Ate all the shellfish. Shopped all the discount stores. Brought home all the things.

When I got home, the kid had cleaned the whole house (I mean really clean, including my terrible desk area), and bought food and birthday ice cream for me. I ordered dim sum for the family and we hung out companionably.

Today, I turn 45. Tomorrow, I go back to work. The next day, I start school (squee!). Things I want to do in this coming year include:

1) Kick butt at school
2) Increase my fitness and flexibility
3) Start a container garden
4) Get out of debt

I feel really optimistic about my ability to do these things, but I'm also feeling pretty philosophical about it all. I'll do what I can, and the rest will be as it is.

I'm looking around for graduate degree programs to apply to after I've aced the GRE (what? I'm gonna kick its ass!) and I may as well start keeping track here, so I can find it later, now that I don't have google docs any more. I'm going to add to it as the day goes on and I do more research. Tagging these sorts of things with the "being a co-ed" tag.

Not going to list degrees from places like University of Phoenix and National University, as I'd almost rather not go than attend someplace I'm not super-proud of. I'm also skipping places like the University of San Francisco, which is a Catholic school, even though I know it's a good school.

In-person (local) Master's Degrees:

Counseling

CSU San Francisco:
Clinical Psychology: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/psychol.htm#745
Counseling: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/counsel.htm#1253
MSW: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/social.htm#1097

CSU East Bay:
Counseling: http://www20.csueastbay.edu/ecat/graduate-chapters/g-epsy.html#ms-coun
Marriage and Family Therapy Option, http://www20.csueastbay.edu/ecat/graduate-chapters/g-epsy.html#ms-coun
MSW: http://www20.csueastbay.edu/ecat/graduate-chapters/g-sw.html#mas-soc-wk

UC Berkeley:
MSW: http://socialwelfare.berkeley.edu/

Disability-related stuff:

CSU San Francisco:
Communicative Disorders: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/speciale.htm#1632
Master of Arts in Education: Concentration in Special Interest Area: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/adminint.htm#501539
MA Special Education, emphasis on one of the following: Guide Dog Mobility, Mild/Moderate Disabilities, Moderate/Severe Disabilities, Orientation and Mobility, Physical and Health Impairments, Visual Impairments, Vocational Special Education: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/speciale.htm#501535
Rehab counseling: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/counsel.htm#1521

CSU East Bay:
Special Ed, Mild-Moderate Disabilities or Moderate-Severe Disabilities Option, http://www20.csueastbay.edu/ecat/graduate-chapters/g-epsy.html#ms-spec-edu
Speech-Language Pathology: http://www20.csueastbay.edu/ecat/graduate-chapters/g-sppa.html#ms-spe-lang-path

Education-type things:

CSU San Francisco:
Education, Equity and Social Justice in Education: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/adminint.htm#400
Education, Instructional technologies: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/insttech.htm#167

UC Berkeley/SFSU Joint:
Special Ed: http://www-gse.berkeley.edu/

In-person (local) doctoral programs [Note: as I said to ajnabieh: "I decidedly do not want a Ph.D. -- I think it's a bad career move, and I think that Ph.D. programs only encourage people to take Ph.D. programs so they (the programs) will have more research assistants to do their work for them. That said, my boss wants me to get a Ph.D. (she's got one) and if I don't at least look at the programs, I can't tell her I did due diligence. :-)"]

CSU San Francisco:
Ph.D. Education, Concentration in Special Education: http://www.sfsu.edu/~bulletin/current/programs/speciale.htm#2164

Mills:
Ed.D.: http://www.mills.edu/academics/graduate/educ/programs/educational_leadership.php#phd

UC Berkeley:
Psychology: http://psychology.berkeley.edu/
MSW/PhD: http://socialwelfare.berkeley.edu/

Online Master's Degrees:

Community-development sorts of things:

Penn State, Community and Economic Development: http://www.worldcampus.psu.edu/degrees-and-certificates/community-and-economic-development-masters/overview

Counseling and therapy

UMass:
Family Therapy: http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Master-Family-Therapy-Counseling.cfm
Mental Health Counseling: http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Master-Mental-Health-Counseling.cfm

Disability-related counseling sorts of things

UMass:
Curriculum and instruction, autism studies option: http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Masters-Behavioral-Autism.cfm
Rehab counseling: http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Master-Rehabilitation-Counseling.cfm
Vision studies (orientation and mobility): http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Master-Vision-Studies-Orientation-Mobility.cfm
Vision studies (visual rehabilitation therapy): http://www.umassonline.net/degrees/Online-Degree-Master-Vision-Studies-Rehabilitation-Therapy.cfm


Educational Technology

Penn State: http://www.worldcampus.psu.edu/degrees-and-certificates/instructional-systems-educational-technology-masters/overview

1) I feel like I'm neglecting 3WFDW, but let me just say I love Dreamwidth.

2) I have chosen not to appeal my rejection from Cal, after doing some research and deciding I don't have a good, solid basis for an appeal. So I am happy to report I'll be going to Cal State East Bay in September. So much is great about this, including a major that looks more interesting to me than UC Berkeley's did. The only drawback really is the commute, and I can cope. Yay, I'm gonna be a co-ed!

3) My boss has been SUPER ROCKTASTIC about supporting me in my quest to return to school. Yay, good bosses!

4) Experimental data suggests it's not the cold, damp weather that makes my body hurt all over. Damn. I was kinda hoping the warm weather would have a beneficial side effect of making me not ouchy.

5) My mom wants to cancel her knee surgery in June because she intensely dislikes the surgeon. I plan to call Kaiser's Member Services for her tomorrow and see what her options are. She's in a lot of pain and needs the surgery, but I support her desire not to let someone cut into her if she has a bad feeling about him. (She's not generally squeamish, and has undergone much more serious surgeries without a peep of complaint.) Any advice about advocating for her would be welcome.

6) The kid and I just can't seem to connect lately. We're not yelling or fighting; We get hurt and quiet instead. It makes me sad, but I guess I'm glad that we know how to go through tough times without being mean to each other.

7) Last year, my two charities of choice were the Ms. Foundation and Doctors Without Borders. I usually choose new charities earlier in the year, but this year I'm lagging, mainly because I've been dead-ass broke. But my new hours went through and I'm a little less dead-ass broke, so I'm soliciting suggestions on where you think my money would do the most good in the world. Past choices have been NPR, the Pediatric AIDS Foundation, Barack Obama's campaign, things like that. (Also open to the idea of sticking with one or both of my current choices, if they feel like they're promoting the highest good.)

8) I like the number 8. In my weird brain, numbers are either "sharp" or "round". This appears to have something to do with their shape as written, but also with their odd/evenness, but it's unpredictable and I'm not sure why I even connect it with odd/even/shape at all. For that matter, I don't know why my brain categorizes them that way, since I don't do anything with that information beyond noticing it.

7 is sharp, obviously, on both counts, but 3 is round (even though it's odd) and 4 is sharp even though it's even, and 9 is sharp even though it's shaped like a round number, and now that I've written that, my brain is having a crisis of definition and wants to convince me 9 may be both sharp and round, but I've never had a number that was both before. 13 is sharp. So's 14. 16 is round. So's 99. I have only articulated this once or twice before, and have never met anyone else for whom numbers have these "shapes".

Cal said no. I am genuinely fine with this, though I will likely appeal, because my office is very very eager to help me put together an appeal package. So basically, I can go to a school I really want to go to, or a school I want to go to. My life, she does not suck.

1) Made a batch of about 40 gougeres (minus two for each of us) for a work party. Not going in until 2pm, which is actually harder for me than leaving the house at 7 the way I usually do, because I've gotten settled in to my homebody rhythm, and switching over to workaday speed is a little tough. No big deal, but I do prefer mornings. I don't know how the hell that happened.

2) This weekend, going to the opening of a project Guy has been working on for more than a decade. If you look closely, you can see him at the left of the picture, in his shiny red wheelchair. Then I plan to spend Sunday redesigning the blog, unless some sweet soul offers to do it for me.

*crickets*

Yeah, didn't think so.

3) Three weeks from today, I'll find out if I was accepted at UC Berkeley for the fall. If not, I will be disappointed but not crushed, because I've already gotten into Cal State East Bay, and it's a good school with a program that sounds right for me. I am not looking forward to the long commute, but it's worth it, and I'll get good at studying on the bus, I'm thinking.

Thank you all for your congratulations and votes of confidence. I am actually kind of surprised that I was accepted to an actual university. Without even lying on my application. ;-)

I've spent some time today geeking about how I'll get to campus, and so on. I'm not even going to tell you how much of my brainpower is being used to think about school supplies and prerequisites and so on. I'm such a school geek!