By Amy Nielsen
Right now I have a projected plan of earning a master’s degree and license in five years. I just happened upon a professional school that has many of the pieces I need to pull together already bundled into one certificate program.
The school is not an institution that would lead to sitting for a license and would be a slightly different tangent to what I had originally planned, but would use my current skills and educational background to better effect. It is also more closely aligned with my ultimate employment goals.
So, now I come to a fork in the road. Which path do I take? The master’s degree program or professional school? Or can I do both?
The program I found is a 1-year, online program. It does dove tail into a master’s program at a several different universities, but not the one I was planning to attend. There is one that is close to me, but not close enough to travel to for daily classes.
If the credits I earn for this program don’t fulfill the missing requirements in my antique transcript to transfer to my first choice master’s program or the most local master’s program is not online, then it doesn’t make sense to take the time to do this now.
If the dovetail master’s is online, this becomes a total no brainer and I do both. I could use those resources of time and tuition on classes at our local community college, especially those that I know will cover and transfer. Since the interim school is a fully online course, I expect that at least one of the follow-on master’s programs will be as well.
Right now, I have lots of ifs. So, I have more research to do.
Earlier in this process I wrote a list of jobs I wanted to do when I finished my education. It covers a wide range and includes: returning to the kitchen as a chef; creating a product to sell; writing a book and culinary coaching.
I finally decided that in this day and age, I don’t have to choose. I can do all of those things. In fact, I should do all of those things to stay relevant to the current topics and trends in the industry. This interim school would help me fill that jack of all trades niche of integrative diet and culinary coach.
