I am currently a student at Collins College, praying to be out of there by this coming December. I recently failed a course at Collins and have heard every excuse as to why. Each course is 5 weeks long and it is written that if you miss MORE than 5 days it's an automatic fail.
The second week into the class my grandmother passed away. Therefore I was out of town for a week, which was four days. I was then absent another day due to a cold. After I came back for being gone for the four days I explained to my instructor what had happened and he acted like he was willing to coorporate with me and my time restraints. I do all the work, I end up doing extra work just to make sure that I can pass. The next session started I saw on the schedule that I was in the next class. Thinking a huge load had been lifted off my shoulders I got a tad too comfortable. There was a knock on the door and the Animation head Chris McGhee was there and wanted to speak to me.
He tells me that I need to go back to the class I was just in, asking him why, thinking it was a logical request. He looked at me and said obviously you failed. Confussed as to why and to what was going on, i stormed back into the room got my stuff and went back. Later that week the grades came out and I looked at mine to see how close I was. I found out I wasn't close at all. Next to my ID number was % 00.0. It was a shock, and very depressing.
A month earlier they had instituted a new rule, you fail the class and you have to take it over, then you have to pay us around a thousand dollars to take it over. And since you have to take it over, it's just more money in there pocket. My new teacher asked Chris McGhee if he understood the circumstances to my absences and he said "that's just the way it has to be". Meaning who the hell cares as long as I get a new stereo for my car. So I have to take the class over, I already have all the work, so I sit in the classroom twiddling my thumbs waiting for 12 o'clock. And since I want to avoid being at Collins as much as possible I have doubled up my class schedule. Therefore retaking the class in the morning running over to work, then leaving there and heading to my evening class.
Collins promised us that we were going to be learning the state of the art programs that are in the industry. During my 18 months instructors, classes and dreams have changed. They dropped a class from the animation program because they felt like it. It was figurative drawing. They had told us, and actually still tell us that that is the most important thing, to know how to draw. They just barely started teaching 3D-studio Max. However, because I'm almost done I don't get to touch the stuff.
3 months ago I was in a MAYA class with a teachers assistant named Marc. After that session he graduated from Collins, and then just last session I had a friend of mine attend a class he was teaching. He hasn't worked in the field, he was teaching Flash and he doesn't know flash but what's in the book. With all the money and time that we are investing in this establishment it's depressing to think that they can't even give us credible instructors. Most are over worked, and not motivated. Which then tends to rub off on the students.
If there was anything that I could do differently about the whole situation it would be to believe the protestors that were standing out front of school on my first day of class.
My 25,000 dollars are now almost flushed down the toilet. I wanted to do this as a living, I wanted to invest my time and money, and now I've lost all the motivation I had to a frusterating effort of graduating. I could have gone out and bought the programs and the books and learned almost exactly the same thing, if not more. That way I would have all the programs and software at my own house to be able to touch whenever possible.instead of on Collins' time. I'm sure there are going to be people out there that will respond by saying if I put more effort into the program than I would've gotten more out of it. Sure maybe you're right. But it's really hard to keep working on something that in the end you know wont help you. The idea that the second I tell someone that I attended Collins College that they overlook me is a huge smack in the face, and then you sit back and say to yourself why bother.
If you have any comments at all whether good or bad please feel free to write me at [email protected]
Rebeka
Phoenix, Arizona
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