Not As Easy As All That

I initially assumed the most difficult thing about returning to full time study was the decision itself. Sadly that’s not been the case.

First of all there’s the whole complexity of finding the course you want to do, who offers the course including what campuses those are and then the true nightmare begins, working out how to actually apply. In Victoria there’s a sort of common application system called VTAC.

The frustrating thing is that there’s a wide gamut of different entry requirements for undergrad degrees for non year 12 students (that’s me) and while VTAC should tell you these, it doesn’t always because some Unis really don’t have their Shit Together. Some Unis don’t have any additional requirements (other than a Pi form which is basically a questionaire about work experience and motivation), some want you to sit a sort of idiot test (SAT) and others really don’t want you at all like Monash. Monash are legendary, these guys seriously only take someone who’s sat through a Cert IV at TAFE level – my inner-cynic assumes that’s something to do with the fact they want to flog you their ‘foundation year’ year 12 college thing.

Anyhow, some advice I got at an RMIT open night was that making a nuisance of yourself of yourself would pay dividends, particularly if you don’t get in. Applying that logic immediately  to RMIT itself I did find out, because they were good enough to tell me, that I really didn’t have a great chance of getting in to the course I wanted there. Lots of year 12 competition. Not a lot of consideration for Johnny Come Lately Old Blokes. Fair cop guv, thanks for telling me.

So now I’m exploring other options such as Deakin (I really like their approach, and their staff research but the campus location aint great for networking) or using the CAP program at Melbourne (Cynic mode: a thinly justified way to turn domestic students into full-fee paying students) with some off-campus from Deakin.  I’ve had a different favored scenario every couple of days as stuff comes to light, digging through variable quality Uni web sites and getting the odd nugget back from Uni staff who are good enough to reply.

It’d actually be quite a fun research excersize under normal circumstances but it’s me that’s got quite a lot to lose here. Eg being stuck without a substantial way to undertake the studies in my chosen area in 2010, or at least having to do them off campus. That’s a horrific outcome.

I’ll soldier on making a nuisance of myself in the meantime. On one hand I’m doing a pretty good job of maintaining a positive outlook because by Chris I will make this work… but it’s hard not to be a little frustrated when you’re willing to fork out astoundingly large amounts of cash, being hugely self motivated, studying exactly the shit the country needs to get ahead … meanwhile the Unis are crammed with foreign students. I’m not saying they shouldn’t be, I’m saying think I’m exactly the sort of person they need because likely it’ll be me ultimately kicking out those published academic papers they crave so much.

I’ll make it work, I just feel like it shouldn’t be this hard to make it work given my circumstances.

I guess I just need to get over myself, that’s one course prerequisite they don’t specify but which is surely as important as any other.