2009 WGU Winter Commencement
Saturday, January 24, 2009
Salt Lake City, Utah

The 2009 Winter Commencement will take place Saturday, January 24, 2009 in Salt Lake City, Utah, at Kingsbury Hall. Due to other events taking place in the city, we would like to encourage graduates to make travel and lodging arrangements as soon as possible. Please visit the WGU Commencement site at www.wgu.edu/commencement for detailed information about commencement,lodging, and regalia.

Important Reminders

Graduation Application Deadline information. Only students who have completed their program requirements need to apply for graduation. The commencement program will only include the names of graduates who apply for graduation by the application deadline of Friday, December 19, 2008.

Register to attend the Commencement Ceremony. Register online at www.wgu.edu/commencement to participate in the commencement ceremony. Registration Closes: Friday, December 19, 2008. Students who missed the previous commencement are welcomed to register and walk at the 2009 Winter Commencement Ceremony.

Book your travel and lodging reservations. Due to other events taking place in the city, travel and lodging arrangements need to be made ASAP. WGU has set aside a limited number of rooms at a discounted rate in three hotels (Residence Inn Cottonwood, Chase Suites Hotel - Salt Lake City, Hilton Garden Inn - Sandy). Please visit the commencement page for more information.

Purchase your cap and gown at the Jostens web site. IMPORTANT NOTE: WGU has changed the color of student regalia from black to navy (school color). The last day to order regalia by phone is Friday, January 9, 2009.

To see a list of Commencement FAQs, please click here.

Commencement Information:
Telephone: 1-866-895-9660 ext. 2085
E-mail: alumni@wgu.edu
Web: www.wgu.edu/commencement




WGU Featured in Time Magazine

Great news! WGU was featured in Time Magazine in an article titled, “Go Western, Young Man.”The article appeared in the November 14, 2008 edition of the weekly periodical. Be sure to read this wonderful article about WGU and share it with your friends and family. Also, show your school spirit and post it on your Facebook and MySpace pages.




Boxes! WGU Goes to China
By Joy Critchfield, Teachers College student

Boxes! Boxes! Boxes! I'm packing stuff inside the boxes while thinking outside the box!

Eighteen boxes of library books are, literally, taking a slow boat to China. One hundred twenty-one pounds of luggage has safely flown (in 23.5 hours) to Qingdao…and so have I! Fall is lovely here in a city sandwiched between the Yellow Sea and the Lao Shan Mountains. Yesterday, my 20 first graders and I used fall leaves as stencils to make our new reward chart. One year ago (November 2007), when I enrolled at WGU, China seemed…well, like the other side of the planet!

My first semester at WGU went well, and because WGU doesn’t limit the number of credits a student is able to complete in a semester, I was able to finish 24 credit units. The second semester began in May and was going along smoothly when reality hit “Yes! After 30 years of trying to earn a Bachelor of Arts in Education with teacher certification, this time – at WGU - I finally had all the tools to succeed!” Dreams were solidifying into reality.

Then came the second realization. With the credits accepted during transfer, I would complete Interdisciplinary Studies this semester. When my next term began in December, I would begin Foundations of Teaching and Effective Teaching Practices, including pre-clinical experiences in the classroom. Now that the time to observe in classrooms was approaching, my traditional 9-5 job wasn’t compatible with school visitation. No problem, I thought. I'm leaving soon to start my new teaching career, anyway. It's time to take the plunge and find new employment! Once the light bulbs of realization began to turn on, a new world of ideas came into view:

Aha - WGU is asynchronous! I am not locked into working any one time of day. I can work evenings and visit schools during the day. Or, I can change time zones, and look for schools outside my present location. So, I put together a resume and gathered up my references. Then it hit me …

Aha - WGU is online! I can look for employment anywhere there is Internet access. And what better way to look for employment compatible with my online studies than to put my resume online, too! And that’s when it happened! Job offers arrived from schools, public and private, on several continents.

I’d been thinking locally and this was totally unexpected. But my current coursework is “Reasoning and Problem Solving in the Context of the Humanities”, so I decided to approach this newfound opportunity from a logical point of view. And logically, all of these are possibilities at WGU … if you are willing to ignore the boxes. (Of course, you wouldn't be at WGU if you didn't already know how to look beyond traditional in your search for excellence!) And logically, there is no better time and place to study the world of education than with Western Governors University, anywhere in the world.

So, I grabbed the opportunity, threw my belongings into boxes, and here I am, at Korean International School in Qingdao, China. What started as "How am I going to visit in the classroom and still work full time?" - led to an "Aha!" moment, which then led to another. Inspired by WGU's unique educational model, I've leapt outside the box and landed at a fantastic school, on the other side of the planet! I’m working full time while observing highly qualified teachers from all over the world, and I am studying education at the finest university in the world! From my perspective, I’ve found the best of both worlds. I’ve been here a week, have learned to eat with chopsticks and enjoy kimchi.
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Mentor Spotlight: Missy Gordon
Mentor, Teachers College

Missy Gordon grew up in rural Utah, and today resides in Salt Lake City. She loves everything that involves her 7-year old Lhasa Apso (Brandy), yoga, and relaxing at home with a good book.

Missy has been with WGU for three and half years. She started as an enrollment counselor for WGU and a year and a half ago became a mentor for WGU’s Teachers College. Prior to joining WGU, she was working in Educational Research focusing specifically on children with disabilities.

When asked about working for Western Governors University, Missy tells us: "I am excited to work for an organization whose mission statement includes providing access to education to students who might not otherwise be able to pursue their education through traditional means. It never ceases to amaze me what my students are able to accomplish while having a full-time job, a family and other commitments. As a current WGU MBA student myself, they inspire me. I feel very fortunate to work with WGU students to help them achieve their goals, so that someday they will have a classroom of their own."
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Surviving the Current Credit Crisis
by Mike Fibonacci, College of Business student

Getting a college degree doesn’t have to be expensive or achieved solely through a mountain of credit card bills. With a wide variety of options available, today’s college student can avoid the trap of becoming burdened by overwhelming educational debt.

Mainstream media sometimes focuses on graduates who owe about as much as a mortgage or who have forked over six figures for a PhD and can’t find a job other than working at the local coffee shop. This biased portrayal of the ratio of rising college expenses to scarce job opportunities has created unnecessary panic among college students to the point where some are dropping out for fear of piling on long-term and worrisome debt. In actuality, the opportunity for getting an affordable degree – without plunging into colossal debt - is available for the first time to an unprecedented amount of people.

At one time, it was assumed that college degrees were reserved only for those who were “privileged” or “gifted.” The truth is that college-entry barriers are diminishing and any person who truly desires to earn a degree now has that opportunity. The current credit crisis is not going to stop students from getting the money needed to fulfill their educational goals. Recent laws passed by the federal government can actually help a greater number of students to pursue degrees, this being a logical and sensible course of action to take while waiting out this current crisis and its accompanying increase in hiring freezes.

In addition to passing H.R. 6889 (this extends the authority of the Secretary of Education to purchase guaranteed student loans for an additional year), Congress has increased the budget and availability of financial aid funds to low-and middle-income earning students. Federal financial aid offers Pell grants and low-interest loans that are completely backed by the government, which means that a credit score is not the deciding factor in borrowing the funds.

The tuition at WGU is relatively affordable at about $5,780 per year. For students who qualify for financial aid, the maximum amount of Pell grant that could be received per year is $4,731. This leaves a balance of $1,730, which may be covered completely through financial aid loans. Financial aid won’t allow a student to borrow enough funds to live a lavish lifestyle while in school but whom are we kidding? Eating beans and giving up the mocha-lattes are all part of “paying the dues” in the real career world.

In the worst-case scenario, for those students who don’t qualify for financial aid or have the excellent credit rating required to borrow their tuition from a bank, a part-time job would realistically cover the full WGU tuition. Taking into account a worst-case scenario and earning the bare minimum wage of $6.55, then multiplying that by working a 20-hour week, one would slip by with enough cash to pay for WGU’s tuition. WGU also offers cash-paying students a “two payment” plan and accepts checks and major credit cards. There are also a number of private scholarships available to some students through WGU and www.finaid.org/scholarships.

To sum it all up, the good news is that with WGU’s affordable tuition, students don’t really have that much to worry about when it comes to going to school during the current credit crisis.

The views and opinions expressed in the above article do not necessarily reflect those of WGU.
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The Alumni Speak: You Can Do It Too.
By Larry Manch, Teachers College graduate and member of the WGU Alumni Advisory Board

How do you juggle all of the obstacles that stand in your way as you pursue your dream of a college degree? Is your situation anything like this husband and wife's story?

You and your spouse both work. She is working full time, mostly afternoons and nights, and you work early in the morning. Your children are young; one is in Pre-K and the other is still in diapers. It is a daily struggle to find the time to accomplish everything that your family needs you to do, but you are highly motivated and up to the challenge.

How many tasks are left? Take a moment to imagine yourself submitting that final Taskstream task. It is one of the motivating factors that keeps you moving ahead. Just watching that number diminish reminds you that you are making progress. You know that as long as you keep pushing and working it will happen---you will graduate with that coveted WGU degree. Until then though, you just keep smiling and plugging away.

Before you know it, it is time to pick up your Pre-K child from school. Your spouse has your only car, so you will have to walk to school to pick them up. An hour later, you are back home working on tasks. The kids play happily while you are working and still have one ear listening for them. Soon, it’s time to make dinner. After everyone eats, the kids play as you clean up, then it’s bath time. After baths, they like to watch a favorite cartoon; just enough time for you to finish and submit a task. After the cartoon, it is quiet time. You sit on the couch with a precious child on either side, relaxing and enjoying the chance to just sit and hug the babies as they fall asleep.

Just about the time you are exhausted and ready to go to bed, your spouse arrives home after a long day at work and she too is exhausted. She is also a WGU student, and she barely has enough time to keep up with her studies while working full time. It’s not much fun to see each other for only a few minutes each day, but you know that when you graduate from WGU, hopefully, all of this will change for the better.

Does this scenario sound familiar? It is very familiar to me and my wife. This was our story from October 2004 - March 2006, while we were both WGU students. It wasn’t easy, but we both knew that as long as we kept at it, we could hope for a better life for our family. Now, we are both teachers with no more working nights, weekends, or holidays. Our hard work paid off and we stayed the course.

You can do it too. Never give up

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