Students
Students at the College are diverse in age, cultural and economic background, and professional goals. But one thing unites them all: a commitment to improving their lives and future through education.
Christopher M., Upper Darby
Career goal: financial services
Chris was serving with the First Cavalry in Southern Baghdad in 2004 when he met a man who was interested in investments and business. “I was always interested in psychological kinds of things, and we would talk,” said Chris. “He showed me how my psychological interests fit in to a career in business. It really inspired me.”
He was discharged from the Army in 2006, came back to his native Upper Darby and enrolled at Delaware County Community College.
“When I got out of Upper Darby High School in 1998, I just wasn’t mature enough to go to college,” said Chris. He was in the bricklayers’ union for three years and then, after the 9/11 attacks, joined the Army. “When I was in the Army, I saw that people who had better a education than I did were getting better assignments and more responsibility.
The program at Delaware County Community College was best for me. I got a good education for a price I could afford at the time. I will always be grateful for that.”
“Now I know I will get a good job,” he said. He plans to follow up his associate degree in business administration from the College with a bachelor’s degree in finance from Temple University.
Andrew M., Upper Darby, A.S., biology 2010
Career Goal: biologist
Andrew believes in the adage that your success will often depend on just how badly you want it.
The former college stop-out says he took four years off after a few years at a large research university to enter the business world – a world that, after a while, he found “repetitive and routine and offering no upward mobility.”
Dr. (Judith Keller) Amand (assistant professor of biology) said if I earned a ‘C’ in her biology course, it meant I was an average student. A ‘B’ meant I was a pretty good student, and an ‘A’ meant that biology might be a good career choice for me.”
Andrew, an Upper Darby native, has not yet decided if he’ll pursue field work or a hospital setting for his career, but he’s sure he has found the right major at the right school.
It is affordable, and the faculty are excellent teachers and motivators."
The self-described part-time student, part-time worker and part-time musician also is a part-time tutor, assisting students at the College in biology, algebra and trigonometry. He completed 20 credits over two semesters last year, and he’s tackling 15 credits in fall 2009.
Did we mention he got an “A” in that bio course?