A letter to Max Part 2

This blog post is a 2nd letter to Max, my cousin who is now starting his adulthood graduating from high school. It's meant to be sort of a brief biography meant to give Max a peek into how his future might look as a young male vietnamese adult. Here's a bit more on my experience.

I can speak a little for Quan too on our motivation for college. My mom's take on going to college is that it was very much expected. She and my dad had to put my Sisters through before Quan and I did and money was very very tight for her but even despite that, she would always tell me and Quan was something like this. "It doesn't matter if we don't have much money, you are going to school and we will find a way for that money to be there". She would always pressure us to do a good job in school as to get a great job afterwards.

What college did you go to?

I went to Western Washington University which is about 3 hours north of where we grew up in Tacoma. Western is a state school and at the time was about 12,000 students in size. College tuition for us at the time averaged about 1000 bucks per quarter. I did four years there doing 3 quarters per year. I got a few scholarships in the first two years which paid for tuition but after which, my parents helped me to pay tuition. Prices have gone up since I went school; looks like it's now about 1700 bucks per quarter. Here's the link to our current price breakdown the school I went to for today:

http://admissions.wwu.edu/tuition/t_tuition.html

Those numbers are if you pay for staying at the school and such. If you live close to home and are frugal about your expenses, you can cut some expenses to get you through more cheaply. A good example of something that saved me a lot of money was frequent trips home to stock up on mom's cooking. =)

Did you ever consider going to work right after high school?

I talked to a Navy recruiter who said that I had pretty good grades in high school and tried to recruit me to go to an academy and become an officer. I thought this would have been pretty cool but it was pretty much out of the question for my mom and dad. Our parents stressed education as one of the single most important things we need to do in our lives. So, just working out of highschool wasn't really an option, although for some it's not necessarily a bad thing.

What is this thing called the college experience?

Up until you're 18, you're living with your parents. When you go to college, even if you are still living at or close to home, you have to make your own decisions. You pay for your own schooling unless you get some scholarships. If you don't go to class, the only one that's going to care is you. Professors and Instructors are there because you paid them for their services. College is a place where you learn because you want to, not because it's something you just have to do. It's also a tremendous opportunity. Because college is a place you choose to be, if you decide to go, you are surrounded by people who are generally intelligent, driven and motivated to do great things. And for the most part, they are your same age, so chances are you'll love to hang out and have fun while learning.

What was your major?

Back in 1998, the internet and tech was HOT. So naturally I picked Computer Science as it seemed like a great way to a good job. I heard that people coming out into the Tech job market making oodles of money. Of course as I mentioned earlier the Tech bubble bursted and the job market was tough but in general it was true. Even after the bubble burst, there was still good demand for properly trained Software Engineers. Computer Science was a great option for me because I was pretty comfortable with Math. I started into college doing Calculus where as many folks tested into algebraic classes. Needless to say my math was stronger than my writing or history for which I started with the 101 courses.

What made you pick this college/major over others? Who was your major influence/idol that pushed you?

I chose Western because both of my sisters went there. At the time, I didn't even know that I wanted to major in Computer Science. It's actually a lucky thing, many folks I knew who went to college took a lot of time in deciding what they wanted to concentrate their studies in. For some, doing the first two years at a community college served them better as it's cheaper yet you can still get the basic requirements necessary for more concentrated studies later. It was nice to know that my sisters made great money after they went through college. They both came out making very very nice salaries after going to school.

How has going to college shaped your lives?

Going to college really gives you tools necessary to see what's possible out there. It's kind of weird but the more you know, the more things you find out you don't know and the world seems to get bigger. You also meet so many people who are creative and intelligent, even if they don't seem to have the right answer for the problem at hand. Surrounding yourself with people like that is huge. To this day in my job I'm surrounded by very very intelligent people who help me grow. This has proved to be worth a ton in money and just as growing as a person.

I actually met Jessica in college. My dad had a saying, something like ... try to meet girls at the market. I think with the assumption being that meeting a girl shopping for food at the market, you might find a good home maker. There's probably a huge difference between meeting a girl at the club or meeting one in school. Well, I won't say which is better but meeting Jess has been very very good for me.

And lastly how immensely different would your life be if you hadn't gone to college? Where would you be now?

It's hard to say what it might have been if I never went to school. I feel that I'm a pretty hard worker, maybe I would have been very creative and started my own business. Or I could have been very comfortable working at a job which didn't require as much education. I can only say for sure that without having done the education that I did, I couldn't be where I'm at today.

Hope this helps! Tuan, do you have any questions?

Quoc