My Time at Full Sail University

Specialized schools tend to have a mixed reception from what I've seen, but after looking online before and after graduation, Full Sail University seems to be the exception. Most seem to have had an exceptional experience and the only ones who are bitter about it are the ones who squandered the opportunities given after graduation.

In a single word I'd describe Full Sail University simply amazing. I attended online courses so this is being written from that perspective. When applying I did have the choice of attending on campus, however I didn't want to move to Florida for various reasons. Boy, am I glad I didn't go. At one point I would have preffered physically being in the classroom but now I easily preffer an online environment.

The ease of use of the online resources, student portal, flexible schedule; everything was just so readily available that it was practically stress free. That's not the same as saying it was easy; it certainly wasn't. Online classes do have their own challenges. Flexible scheduling is a huge plus, but it does have its downsides as well, the biggest of which is balancing. It can be hard to fit everything you need to do all in a single day. Fortunately for me this wasn't a huge issue as I opted to go to college full-time.

What was the downside I had to deal with? The lack of community. Trying to have conversations with other students outside of assignments was hard. Eventyally I just stopped attempting to do. There were message boards to use for the class to communicate but those all ended up being extremely repetitive. All of the them filled with the same udentical statements: "I wish everyone luck in this class", or "congratulations everyone on passing the previous class". I eventually got to the point where I just stopped paying as much attention. I believe that point was around halfway through the curriculum.

The other biggest gripe I have is just the order of the classes. I would have preferred to get algebra done and over with very early. It's not my best subject, it might possibly be my worst actually, so I would have preferred for it to be my first class. Just go ahead and get done and over with, right? Instead, it was about halfway through the course. Swapping it with one of the first classes would have saved me some dread.

So what about the rest of the courses and my instructors? The quality varied. I would have liked a much more draconian approach from more of the instructors, as many of them were extremely lax in how they approached their subject. In fact, the level of difficulty I would have liked was only present in about six or seven classes out of almost (or somewhere around) thirty. Both television writing classes and comics writing were exactly at the challenge level that I was expecting and wanted. Otherwise, things felt far too easy as many of my grades were in the high nineties.

Now there is the possibility that I was just comprehending the materials far better than others. I got along with my teachers and hardly ever had to communicate with them about difficulties I was having. I don't even remember asking for an extension on a grading period. There was one instance I had to comminicate with an instructor that I had to change something quite heavily but that was due to the pandemic, and he was perfectly okay as it was something that I had no control over.

I befriended a couple classmates and I keep them on Facebook and LinkedIn. I ofeer them my support in their endeavors and they do the same. There isn't much overlap though as our goals never really aligned after graduation. For a while now I've been meaning to get back in touch with a coule of my instructors, as they were of such a great boon while I attended class that I would want to seek their advice for any endeavors that I have now.

Unfortunately, life has reared its ugly head at me. Because of various circumstances my life post graduation has not been what I had planned. I've allowed myself to get distracted by various sources to the point where I don't know if it's even viable to seek out a job that utilizes my Bachelors degree. I've essentially resigned myself to doing primarily freelance work and to write short stories and work on a novel when I have the time.

I'm actually extremely frustrated with myself because I graduated with such high remarks, honors, and grades. I know I can do better. I graduated valedictorian and post graduation I have have nothing to show for it. There is the potential that I'm suffering a little from burnout and my drive will come back but if that's the case then I have no way of knowing when that will be.

Since discovering this site, I believe that I can try to break through the burnout by keeping my shorter works here; those that I beleive are ready anyway. Still, I would not trade my time at Full Sail University for time at another college. I do believe I made the right decisions and that they will ultimately lead me down a road where I can e be content with the professional side of my life. I put so much effort into this aspect of my life and I won't let it go to waste. There is nowhere for me to go but forward. Looking back with regret will gwt me nothing in return and I refuse to feel bad about doing something that I wanted to do.