OSU Alumnae Tabitha/English Major is MOVING!!

Is this OSUM Alumnae’s Move to North Carolina Going to Go Smoothly?

 

“How am I going to get all my packing done and get out of Marion?” is what OSUM Alumnae Tabitha Clark wondered aloud as we spoke about her day on Monday, August 27th. She asked a Magic 8 Ball if her move was going to go smoothly, and the answer was “yes.”

Tabitha has spent the year since graduation reporting all the crime news at The Marion Star, and even won an award for breaking news, but now she feels it is time to move on. While she loves to write, loves her Ohio roots and loves being a Buckeye, she is not seeking to further her career in any of Ohio’s larger market newspapers.

Since Tabitha feels it is really hard to go from a small market paper to a large market in this state, she decided to look beyond her “borders.” She is leaving this Thursday for North Carolina to write for The Jacksonville Daily News.

Tabitha was born and raised in Marion, Ohio.  She graduated from Marion Harding High School in 1998.  She married after high school and moved to Jacksonville, North Carolina with her husband, a Marine stationed at New River Air Station.  They later separated and she moved back home to Marion with her two children in 2005.   Tabitha started classes here on the Marion Campus in the winter 2007 and graduated with her Bachelor of Arts Degree in 2011 with a magna cum laude and honors research distinction in English.

I first met Tabitha in one of Professor Ben McCorkle’s classes, oddly enough a BLOGGING class, where she was a sophomore and “tutoring” our class as part of her independent study class in basic writing pedagogy.

She found her start in journalism on the Marion Campus as student editor and head writer of For Insight and News (FIN).  FIN was the monthly campus news publication for over three years, but unfortunately, it is no longer printed.

In September 2011, just a couple of months after her graduation, Tabitha found herself employed with The Marion Star.  After all the work she’d done to get through school while raising two children on her own and working, just having to go to work eight hours a day seemed like a breeze.

She said, “It was odd because of how much I had done in school, writing my thesis, writing papers for classes, homework, it was so odd to just have a job and go to work, it was almost like a vacation to just have a job and not go to school and work.” 

 

She feels blessed because she went to school for writing and she is working as a writer. She was published in five editions of the Cornfield Review, took ten creative writing classes with Dr. Stuart Lishan, and she was instrumental in the resurrection of the Creative Writing Club (prior to KaPow) on campus here, where she held the position of Vice President. 

At one point she had her hand in everything literary on this campus plus taking classes.  She is “blessed” because this is what she wanted to do and she is doing it.  She parlayed her talent, drive and experience into a career.

I asked her how she came to apply for North Carolina and she said “that’s a really funny story.”

She has actually wanted to move back to North Carolina ever since 2005. One day, she randomly sent an email to the managing editor of the Jacksonville daily newspaper, along with a few clips and information that she would be visiting in July 2012 if the editor was interested in meeting with her.  The editor wrote her back two weeks later and told her there were no positions open at that time but to get in touch with her before her NC trip.  Two weeks later, after Tabitha returned the email with a “thank you for responding,” the editor responded asking for Tabitha’s resume.

A few weeks passed, and Tabitha thought the position had been filled. Three days before she went on vacation (July 18), she received a phone call asking for an interview.  Tabitha had the interview and then two weeks later was offered the job.  She went after this job. She knew she wanted to live in Jacksonville, and she pursued a job that put her in the place she wanted to live.

Tabitha is the author of her own story, making whatever edits necessary in the plot to achieve success by the epilogue.  Strangely enough, Stuart Lishan just popped into the room we are talking in.

Tabitha has accomplished everything she wanted to in her undergraduate career and more.  She received many writing awards, scholarships, including the C. Eugene Maynard Award of Excellence. She went out on a “high note.”

Her time at OSUM taught her that she could accomplish something, and gave her the confidence to move forward into her journalism career and future as a writer. She cherishes the support she still receives from professors like Dr. Stuart Lishan, Dr. Ben McCorkle and Dr. Sara Crosby. They will be her mentors and role models for years to come.

I asked Tabitha to consider writing for this blog, so we will watch for some of her work from the warm shores of North Carolina.  She is going back to the place where her whole 128-page thesis took place – the town of Jacksonville. Call Me Tabs: the Making and Breaking of a Marine Corps Wife is available for viewing at the Ohio State Knowledge Bank, https://kb.osu.edu/dspace/handle/1811/48661.

 

By: Val - August 27, 2012

 

Stephanie Austin, Jr Rank Non-Trad, 2012 Homecoming Court Member

Stephanie Austin is on campus today, Freshmen Welcome Day, Monday, August 20^th, 2012, to be introduced as a member of our Marion Regional Campus Homecoming Court for 2012.  Stephanie is a junior rank non-traditional student.  Stephanie’s major is psychology and her minor is anthropology.  After Stephanie completes her undergraduate degree she plans to attend the main campus of The Ohio State University in the summer of 2013 to begin her Graduate Program in a Master’s of Nursing.  Her goal is to teach nursing at a major university so she will be pursuing and graduating with a PhD.  Her PhD will probably be from The Ohio State University.

I asked her why she wants to teach nursing, Stephanie said she currently has an LPN and there is currently a shortage of nursing educators and she has always wanted to teach nursing so when she decided to pursue her nursing level to an RN, she also decided to keep going and work towards completing her goal of eventually teaching in a university setting. 

Stephanie has been an LPN since 2004.  She started back to classes for her RN in 2010 at our Marion Campus.  She graduated in the Spring of 2012 with her Associates of Arts Degree from The Ohio State University and attended the awards ceremony at our historical (and beautiful) Palace Theatre here in Marion.  She describes our campus as” small but it’s very inviting especially for a non-traditional student.”  She finds the professors are very accommodating and always willing to answer questions at their office hours.  The administration has always assisted her, answered her questions and been willing to help her with any matter needed.  For her personally she has found this campus to be less overwhelming as a non-traditional student than she would encounter personally on our main campus.

Another interesting fact about this student is that she is married to Shad Austin, a local missionary and early Childhood Education major here at OSUM. Stephanie has been on several missionary trips. She has traveled to Mexico on medical missions. She went with an organization called Busses International. She assisted in the on board medical clinic, provided hair cut/services to women and children, handed out new clothing, shoes and food care packages. During this past spring break, Stephanie went to Missouri and work with an organization that helped the recent Missouri tornado victims. In May, she went to the Bahamas and performed with their puppet ministry inside the public school system.  Stephanie said, “She enjoys getting to know new people and is fascinated by the different cultures and customs that she has had the privilege to see”. She also has traveled with OSUM to India. She is the current President of the OSUM India Culture Society and if you would like to join or have every thought about traveling to India please send her an email at Austin.271@buckeyemail.osu.edu.

Stephanie decided to run for homecoming when she was in a conversation with English Professor Alexis Martina.  “Professor Martina expressed to me her feelings that non-traditional students should run for homecoming on this campus because there are students on this campus who make up a vast majority of students and they are involved and should be involved and she encouraged me to apply.”  So she applied and Stephanie was selected as one of three female homecoming court members.  She was officially introduced today, along with the other court members, to our incoming Freshmen class at Welcome Day today.

I asked Stephanie what she would say in encouragement to a non-traditional female student who is starting classes this autumn semester.  “I think the most important thing is to stay encouraged, know your syllabus, when things are due, make a schedule and FOLLOW IT that way you will not feel overwhelmed when due dates approach.”  It’s very hard to juggle classes, kids, husband, home and life, and she finds doing this very helpful.  “If they need help ASK, don’t wait until the last minute when you are struggling, ask your professor right away, they are always willing to help”, Stephanie also strongly advises new non-traditional students starting classes and all students really.

I wish Stephanie good luck in her 2012 Homecoming Court candidacy and to enjoy all the homecoming activities.  I was the 2011 Marion Campus Regional Homecoming Chair and it was truly a great experience watching our first homecoming court go through the candidacy of being on the court and all the wonderful activities our campus and the main campus planned for them.  Then of course the homecoming football game on main campus was a lifetime experience for them and it was just great to be a part of this.

By:  Val

      August 20, 2012

Kathleen Clemons, Admissions/Financial Aid Counselor

I am sitting here with Kathleen Clemons who is one of our Admissions/Financial Aid Counselor’s here on our Marion Campus.  Kathleen has been in this position four years now.  Kathleen received her Bachelor of Arts Degree from The Ohio State University, with a Major in Social Work. Kathleen came to the Marion Campus to pursue her undergraduate degree in 1993.  She herself was a non-traditional student at this time.  She finished her degree in 1997 and then started to work in the Marion School System.

 

Kathleen was born and raised here in Marion.  She decided to go into the area of social work for her major because she wanted to help others and give back to others.  She wanted to be in a position that would enable her to impact the lives of young people.  Kathleen didn’t go to work in a position with a social work agency she put together a job description which encompassed working with youth in the local school system.  She had help putting the job description together with Dr. Leslie Beyer-Hermsen, Dr. Dan Christie, and Larry Prude,  the previous Diversity Coordinator/ Marion Campus.

This job was created and Kathleen worked for the Marion school system from 1997 through 2005.  She found this job to be very rewarding. This also put Kathleen in working hands-on in her passion in working with young people and developing programs to enhance their educational and personal needs.  She watched them grow through this program into responsible students.  This program was enabled and designed originally to grow our own minority teachers but turned into more of a mentoring program.  This program was called “Growing Our Own” and was to try to get our own local minority teachers.  In 1998 the government sent to the State of Ohio grants to the local school districts to promote minority teachers to work in their local school system.  This had to be in collaboration between the Marion City School system and The Ohio State University at Marion.  This program would let the students who wanted to teach be able to attend the OSU Marion Campus and then go back and teach in the local Marion school system.  Unfortunately though the majority of the students in this program wanted to obtain their teaching degrees but move away from the Marion area and not stay and teach within it.

Kathleen found herself in the midst of budget cuts in the local school system and was unemployed for three years before she was hired to work in her current position in July 2008.

Now  she works mostly with non-traditional students who are coming to campus for their first time and transfer students.  I asked her if she has seen a rise in non-traditional students enrolling for their higher education and she said yes, this past year especially.  She feels this is due to the current climate of the economy, and loss of jobs.

I asked Kathleen if she saw trepidation when the new non-traditional comes into to talk to her about financial aid and admissions, she said some are nervous about starting college then some are confident, comfortable and relaxed and ready to get started.  Some of the students want to stay locally due to family responsibility and job, so they want to complete their degree here not transition to classes on the main campus.

Kathleen sees a need to better serve the non-traditional students on our campus so she is heading up putting a “Non-Traditional Student Advisory Committee” together, which she asked me to a part of.  We did have a “Non-Traditional Student Informational Night” here on campus a few months ago which Kathleen was instrumental in putting together.  She asked for my help in the area of the non-traditional military student information and I contacted the offices who have helped me in the past with non-traditional students who are military or family of military and they all came to campus to help us.  There were also non-traditional students who are attending classes here speak on their role on campus in class, student life, student organizations and even a full time employee who is a student herself spoke on her insights on being a student here.  Of the prospective students that attended this informational night but who were not already students, of these not all applied and started classes but some did.  So this makes it a success because we helped individuals start their goal of completing their undergraduate degree and answered all questions that were asked.

(Watch for another chat with Kathleen in the upcoming weeks.)

Kathleen Clemons
Admission and Financial Aid Counselor
The Ohio State University at Marion
1465 Mt. Vernon Avenue
Marion, OH  43302-5628
phone: 740/725-6251
fax:       740/725-6258
e-mail:  clemons.8@osu.edu

By:  Val

       8/2012