For the last 2 years Trios college in Toronto has been running a 4 day program. The Ministry of Education for Ontario province requires full time students to be doing 20 hours per week. 5 hours a day times 4 days a week is 20 hours. BUT if you miss one day you are out of compliance and you cannot make it up. The spare friday used to be saved for the MCAT tests (medical tests similar to SAT and LCAT-the lawyer tests).
Yesterday it was announced that Trios College (Toronto campus) will go back to a 5 day week starting in the first week of January. The MCAT tests will be moved to the weekend. So that means I will lose my day off and my 3 day weekends. I used to do al my laundry on fridays, and the shopping as well. So from January I will have to do the laundry in the half days when I am not studying.
Under the new schedule, Trios will keep the 5 hours a day schedule, which means that classes will be for 4 hours and then one hour lab for students to use the computers for homework or study. And this is for 5 day - making 25 hours a week. So if you miss one day you don't get out of compliance. If you miss two days then you do. So far I have not missed ANY days.
Right now my schedule calls for half days in the afternoon, so I have my mornings free to relax or do homework. Next year (in February) my schedule will change to mornings (ugh - and in the middle of winter too) so I will have to be up a half hour earlier, take a shower and get dressed, get my son up, dresed and fed and get him to daycare by 7.30AM, and then rush for a bus and hope I get to school by 8AM.
Trios works on 3 shifts. 8 am to 1 pm, 1pm to 6pm and 6pm to 11 pm.
I am NOT looking forward to these schedule changes.
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Showing posts with label school. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Week 8 - Day 3
There are no classes this week. We students have this week off school. Partly because it is the first week back at school for kids, and most of the sudents here are parents with kids. And secondly, the teachers need a break, because their last break was back in March around Easter.
Private career colleges do not have a fall term, a winter term and a spring term. They are teaching ALL YEAR ROUND, even during the summer. After all I started this Diploma course in the middle of July - the height of summer. There is usually a 2 week break at Xmas. As well as short breaks at Easter and the end of the summer holidays.
The school is still open but just no classes. For those people who need to use the school computers, they can do that. Next week is the last week of HR. The last exam is on Wednesday 10th. I have an 8 page essay to write for HR, which is due next Tuesday 9th. I havent even started it yet.
Right now I am reminiscing over Helene Hanff and rereading Q's Legacy. I will start the essay tomorrow, I promise.
Private career colleges do not have a fall term, a winter term and a spring term. They are teaching ALL YEAR ROUND, even during the summer. After all I started this Diploma course in the middle of July - the height of summer. There is usually a 2 week break at Xmas. As well as short breaks at Easter and the end of the summer holidays.
The school is still open but just no classes. For those people who need to use the school computers, they can do that. Next week is the last week of HR. The last exam is on Wednesday 10th. I have an 8 page essay to write for HR, which is due next Tuesday 9th. I havent even started it yet.
Right now I am reminiscing over Helene Hanff and rereading Q's Legacy. I will start the essay tomorrow, I promise.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
Week 3 - Day 3 - Powerpoint & Outlook
Powerpoint was a lot of fun.
Outlook was boring.
I already know how to use it.
BUT Omar has to teach it.
And to make things worse, I spilled a paper cup of water over my desk. Fortunately I was already packing up and all my books and papers were in my bag. Most of the water flew off the desk and onto the chair next to mine (that was not being used) so the seat got soaked.
But Omar said Dont worry about that, it will be dry by morning. Just dont touch any wires or you will get a shock. Also luckily no water got into any of the keyboards. I only had to mop up my desk, the seat of the chair next to me and the floor.
I was also lucky that I had 4 cloths in my bag (faceclothes actually) for wiping my face in this sweltering heat and humidity that Toronto is currently under. So I used those to mop up the water. Otherwise I would have had to go all the way to the washroom for handfuls of toilet paper, because I was told that the school does not have any paper towels.
Christina has been absent all this week. There is a rumour she may have been involved in a accident. Which makes for a very quiet class.
Alisha's computer skills are improving. I heard her teaching the two fellows next to her, how to do power point today.
Outlook was boring.
I already know how to use it.
BUT Omar has to teach it.
And to make things worse, I spilled a paper cup of water over my desk. Fortunately I was already packing up and all my books and papers were in my bag. Most of the water flew off the desk and onto the chair next to mine (that was not being used) so the seat got soaked.
But Omar said Dont worry about that, it will be dry by morning. Just dont touch any wires or you will get a shock. Also luckily no water got into any of the keyboards. I only had to mop up my desk, the seat of the chair next to me and the floor.
I was also lucky that I had 4 cloths in my bag (faceclothes actually) for wiping my face in this sweltering heat and humidity that Toronto is currently under. So I used those to mop up the water. Otherwise I would have had to go all the way to the washroom for handfuls of toilet paper, because I was told that the school does not have any paper towels.
Christina has been absent all this week. There is a rumour she may have been involved in a accident. Which makes for a very quiet class.
Alisha's computer skills are improving. I heard her teaching the two fellows next to her, how to do power point today.
Monday, July 21, 2008
Week 2 - Day 1
Back at school for another new week. This week we are doing Microsoft Word and Excel. Next week we will be doing Outlook and Powerpoint.
Another new student started today. D is doing Honours Business Administration - the same course that I am doing. Which means he has the same schedule as me. D is from Switzerland, and is here on a study permit. He speaks fluent French and German, some Italian, and passable English. At least his English will improve while he is here for the next 13 months. He started late today because his study permit was delayed a bit while being processed.
Now about our home work. We were given a list of Word and Excel projects we have to complete between now and next Monday. We can either do these projects at school or we can do them at home, and bring them to school on a disk (floppy disk or a memory stick). The schools are still using Word 2003. But Omar (the instructor) says I can use Word 2007 because thats what we have on our PC at home.
One of the girls (Alisha) started panicking. She was saying I dont know how to save to a floppy disk, I dont know how to save to the P drive (the instructors drive on the school network where we must all save our work). Each student has their own folder.
Alisha had the nerve to tell Omar that he was very rude and unfair because he just sprung this on us without telling us how to do it. Well, actually he did tell us how to do it. Last week in the lecture on computer peripherals. Alisha happened to be away that day.
Another new student started today. D is doing Honours Business Administration - the same course that I am doing. Which means he has the same schedule as me. D is from Switzerland, and is here on a study permit. He speaks fluent French and German, some Italian, and passable English. At least his English will improve while he is here for the next 13 months. He started late today because his study permit was delayed a bit while being processed.
Now about our home work. We were given a list of Word and Excel projects we have to complete between now and next Monday. We can either do these projects at school or we can do them at home, and bring them to school on a disk (floppy disk or a memory stick). The schools are still using Word 2003. But Omar (the instructor) says I can use Word 2007 because thats what we have on our PC at home.
One of the girls (Alisha) started panicking. She was saying I dont know how to save to a floppy disk, I dont know how to save to the P drive (the instructors drive on the school network where we must all save our work). Each student has their own folder.
Alisha had the nerve to tell Omar that he was very rude and unfair because he just sprung this on us without telling us how to do it. Well, actually he did tell us how to do it. Last week in the lecture on computer peripherals. Alisha happened to be away that day.
Friday, July 18, 2008
Day 4
Thursday - the First Exam. All classes are held from Monday to Thursdays with Fridays free. The exam for Computer Fundamentals was 60 questions, mostly taken straight from the text book. The exam was open book, and I was finished in 20 minutes. So I spent the another 20 minutes going over my answers making sure they were correct. I was waiting for someone else to be the first one to get up and hand in their papers. I was second, following closely behind the first person.
Next week we will be doing intermediate Microsoft Word and Excel. The following week I will be doing intermediate Outlook and Power Point. I will be doing all these subjects at an advanced level further along in the course.
Next week we will be doing intermediate Microsoft Word and Excel. The following week I will be doing intermediate Outlook and Power Point. I will be doing all these subjects at an advanced level further along in the course.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Day 3
Well today was an interesting day. There are now 11 students in the class, and 8 of them are doing the Community service worker course. The other two being the medical transcriptionist and of course, there's me doing Business Administration. Some of these 8 students are close to the end of their course, and others have just started.
The new student (Christina) who started today, is a loud attention seeking type of girl. She says she forgot that class started this week and that it was in the afternoon. Now how ditzy is that? Apparently like the others, she too is doing the Community services worker program. She dresses like a street girl - very short dress, large dangling earrings, loud hand bag and very high heels. She talks loud and thinks she knows everything. She kept harping on about cookies and how cookies were bad for the computer and how she tried to delete cookies every day, but she still keeps getting viruses and pop-ups. She says she has a antivirus program, but she doesnt do anything with it. The teacher figured out from the pop-ups that she must have spyware and malware problems but her computer does not have any anti-spyware software loaded. Now I have to put up with her for the next two weeks for the remainder of the Computer Fundamentals class. she says she works at Tim Hortons.
Yesterday we did Windows - the Windows operating system. The school computers all use Windows XP. We were shown in minute detail how to open windows, how to use it, and how to close it. I sat back and listened, not taking any notes and tried not to yawn. I have been using Windows for the last 10 years. I dont think I need to be told how to use it. BUT I will read the book just to make sure I regurgitate all the correct answers for the exam tomorrow.
The new student (Christina) who started today, is a loud attention seeking type of girl. She says she forgot that class started this week and that it was in the afternoon. Now how ditzy is that? Apparently like the others, she too is doing the Community services worker program. She dresses like a street girl - very short dress, large dangling earrings, loud hand bag and very high heels. She talks loud and thinks she knows everything. She kept harping on about cookies and how cookies were bad for the computer and how she tried to delete cookies every day, but she still keeps getting viruses and pop-ups. She says she has a antivirus program, but she doesnt do anything with it. The teacher figured out from the pop-ups that she must have spyware and malware problems but her computer does not have any anti-spyware software loaded. Now I have to put up with her for the next two weeks for the remainder of the Computer Fundamentals class. she says she works at Tim Hortons.
Yesterday we did Windows - the Windows operating system. The school computers all use Windows XP. We were shown in minute detail how to open windows, how to use it, and how to close it. I sat back and listened, not taking any notes and tried not to yawn. I have been using Windows for the last 10 years. I dont think I need to be told how to use it. BUT I will read the book just to make sure I regurgitate all the correct answers for the exam tomorrow.
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