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This Girl's Going to Grad School

In my last post, I mentioned some big plans. And thankfully, I'm now in a position to share some of those. To put some context around it, these last several months have been a period of increased difficulty and unhappiness with my employment situation. Back around 6 weeks ago, I was feeling at my absolute worst, and was trying to figure out where else to go and what to do. Should I look for a new job, should I look to get into some sort of program? And nothing was really clicking. About this time, I was following some social media conversation about the current state of my industry. One of the more well-known Business Analysts brought up the topic of "Business Architecture". It's the concept of helping an organization understand what it's capabilities are, and how to put itself in a position to get to where it wants to be.  On a lark, I googled "Master's in Business Architecture", and up popped a program in "Enterprise Architecture" from Penn State University. I clicked on the link and read more about their program, and at that moment, I knew I had found my niche, and I immediately began the application process. And this past Friday, I received word that I have been accepted for Spring Semester next year.
Penn State Nittany Lions (2005 - Pres)


 Needless to say, this has all happened very fast. I go through moments of complete peace, and moments of being scared to death. How am I going to do this at my age? How am I going to work full time and go to school full time? How am I going to pay for it all? How am I going to manage church responsibilities? Will I be able to have a social life? All big and scary stuff. But I've found that if I take things one step at a time, and complete the next task, I do a lot better, and the fear subsides.

 With this new turn of events, I intend to tweek the career path a few degrees. I still believe in the value of Business Analysis, but I'm more interested in it's strategic value, and in how to influence organizations at a higher level. In preparation for that, I hope to write a lot more. So I'll be setting up another blog specific to that, and I already have a few topics in mind. I'll let you all know when it's up and going.

 In the meantime, I plan to continue Tracie's World, sharing what goes on in my life, and thoughts on gospel topics.

 Anyhoo - that's the latest from Tracie's World. GO LIONS!

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