[ Contents | Search | Reply | Next | Previous | Up ]
From: Lynne Shields
Date: 23 Oct 2006
Time: 09:10:04 -0500
Remote Name: 68.143.177.2
Sarah, I suspect that there are a wide variety of reasons why any of us entered our respective professions. My story is perhaps not terribly inspirational, but here it is nevertheless. I went to college thinking I wanted to be a teacher of the deaf. As a teenager, I used to babysit for a family who had a deaf child and I suspect that this was my only, and probably relatively weak, reason for choosing such a major. As I remember, I lasted about two weeks into my freshman year in that field. I visited the lab school on the campus where I was enrolled, and after observing for awhile, realized that a classmroom setting really was not a good match for me. In fact, I recall a feeling akin to my stomach dropping on realizing that I had not really thought out my choice at all. I trudged over to the department office to give them the news that I was not going to pursue deaf education after all. As I stood outside the office of the chairperson, awaiting my turn, I perused the various pieces of literature on the bulletin board. A brochure about speech-language pathology caught my eye, and I remember thinking, 'now that is something that I would like to do'. I proceeded to transfer to another university after my freshman year. Luckily for me, I loved the major once I began the coursework and never entertained the idea of switching majors after than. You could certainly make the case that I changed focus rather than entirely changing fields--both deaf education and speech-language pathology deal with disorders of human communication. But, I'm not entirely sure that I chose the field after a significant amount of studied thought. A chance reading of a brochure, and the field found me; it happened to be a good fit. I wish you the best in your studies. Regards, Lynne