Bears, Hogs and Hokies!

We are expanding our collegiate fanhood! Our family will be moving to southwest Virginia in the coming summer months where Jonathan has been accepted into Virginia Tech's PhD program for Higher Education Administration. He has also accepted a graduate assistantship position in the Associate Vice President's office that will give him great experience working with numerous department directors while paying his tuition plus a generous part time stipend.

For those of you scratching your head thinking 'what the heck?' here is a bit of background context. Jonathan has been taking classes part time here at the University of Arkansas in their Public Policy PhD program. Once Heath entered our lives this last year, balancing work and school and family became a bit more challenging. So we started talking about what it would take for us to have a schedule that better aligned with our values- ie 1-family then followed by community/work/school/hobbies. Jonathan expressed a desire to be a full time student- and preferably in a program that matched his passion for higher education.

So last fall we worked our way through that too familiar routine of GRE studying and taking (his 5 year scores had just expired- drat!), seeking out reference letters, pulling transcripts, and putting applications in with a few schools. Narrowing down the list to those 'few schools' took a bit of investment too as we looked at what other area colleges would be options for me to work at. In February Jonathan was invited to attend the interview weekend at VT that took place at the end of the month. He was able to travel through Raleigh/Durham and see his brother which was a nice bonus.

Jonathan's visit went great, he loved the area, the faculty he met and staying with one of our former Baylor professors who is now the Assoc. Vice President at VT. If you are making the connection to the above mentioned job Jonathan will have- yes it is working for Frank. (Or as I like to call him these days Frank "make it happen" Shushok). So he came back home and within a few days had an offer from the faculty for the program and for the assistantship. They knew of our family situation and that this would be a dual career search that is likely going to take some time. Conveniently, our conference in Philly was the following week and so I got to meet some more VT people out there, and have a great coffee chat with Frank- interrogating him about the area and the school. They also gave Jonathan his official offer letter while we were out there so we could learn about numbers and dates. (kind of important details)

Jonathan on the lawn at VT

So after we returned to Fayetteville and did a few days laundry and chores settling back in, we finally got to have some quiet space to chat with each other and process through this decision. Jonathan and I both have felt that doors just continue to open at VT and there is no better offer that could possibly be made for him to study what he is passionate about and learn from his assistantship experience. While it would probably feel more comfortable to wait until we have a full time job in hand for me to make this life change decision, we know this is the right decision and timing won't change that. So we are trusting that God will continue to open doors and provide for our family. Yes I would love that to mean a job offer for me by the end of April, but even if that means nothing has panned out by August, we will still choose to move to Virginia and have Jonathan start his opportunities and I will just job search from there.

Our timeline is unknown at this point because of these job search factors, but we have accepted at VT for Jonathan and both given our departments notice here of our intentions to be moved on by the fall semester. I have a few applications in for positions in the Blacksburg area and continue to watch what may come up in this spring season of transitions in higher ed. So there you have it- we are moving to Virginia and expanding our collegiate wear to include the Hokie!