See-Saw.

This past school year has had its share of twists and turns. I have changed my major and changed career paths twice, which I know isn't unheard of. At the start of last year, I was dead-set on being a high-school science teacher. I had two years of in-classroom experience and I had taken (arguably) the best education course I had ever taken that quarter (Thank you Dr. Q). As I started to become more interested in medicine and pharmacy, I made a quick-decision to go into pharmacy because it combined my passion for science with my inherent nature of helping people. For a while, I thought that was a great compromise (I mean, not to mention my paycheck would be like 3x that of a teaching salary). With the interest in pharmacy came the possibility of graduate school, more specifically pharmacy school. During early spring (say like March), I was able to do a job-shadow at the local pharmacy in town (E-burg). Although I only spent a few hours there, I had a feeling that this was not my scene. It wasn't fun and if there is anything that I have learned about jobs, if you do not enjoy it, then do something about it.

So I did something about it. I switched my "plan" from pharmacy to organic/medicinal chemistry. I enjoy organic chemistry; I am good at it and I know it and, surprisingly, well enough that I can explain it to others (My boss trusts me to teach it to other people!). So as of today, I plan on going to graduate school to pursue a degree in Organic/Medicinal Chemistry. Now the $1,000,000 questions are...

1. Where do I go to graduate school?

2. Do I pursue a Master's program or a Ph.D. program?

3. Should I bypass graduate school and go back into education?

I'll be thinking about these questions for the next few months before I take my GRE (which is two months btw) and I also need to think about how my decision will affect myself, Amanda, and my family.