r/WGUTeachersCollege

Hello! I’m currently in the middle of getting my masters in elementary education. I am almost 50 and I was a stay-at-home mom until two years ago when I got a job as a one-on-one para for a little kiddo with CP. I have experience with kids, I have five of my own, but they never got into trouble at school. I had teachers constantly thanking me for how my kids behaved at school and I just brushed it aside with a thanks. Now I see why they thanked me! I’ve worked in kindergarten and now first grade, so my eyes are open to how children behave these days and still decided I wanted to teach - so I guess as long-winded as this was (sorry), I do have an idea of what I’m getting myself into.😬 I’m looking for advice on how to talk to parents about their child’s behavior or having difficult conversations about grades, etc. Any phrases you stick with or???? Honestly, this is my biggest worry, dealing with parents that take no responsibility or ones that helicopter everything. Also, any tried and true ways you’ve used that help with classroom disruptions and behavior issues. If you’ve read this far, thank you!😊🥰 I hope you’re all enjoying your summer!

Has anyone changed mentors or could anyone tell me if this is normal. I feel like every-time I ask her a question or to do something she doesn’t know and refers me to someone else. Now she’s on vacation till the 13th. Last month she was gone like a week plus. And I’ve had experiences where I was insanely frustrated and she criticized my grammar which pissed me off. I just feel like it’s not a good fit and want a proactive mentor who will help me and not just say idk. Last week I asked her about what certification tests I need to take for PA said she didn’t know and didn’t really try to find out. Any questions is referred to someone else or says she doesn’t know. Then wants me to cc on her emails even after I sent because she was no help. I want to change mentors but nervous.

I was so nervous for the OA for this class and ended up rescheduling it two times before attempting it this morning. I passed with exemplary!!! For anyone nervous about it, I used chatgpt to quiz me and that seemed to work like a charm! Don't overthink! You got this!!!

So I'm about halfway through my course work. I am supposed to start early clinicals in November I believe. I just submitted all my documentation to get finger print scanned and back ground checked, the whole 9 yards. What I am confused over: are clinicals apart of a class you take and report back to? Are they separate from your classes and don't have anything to do with course work? Will my clinicals be more immersive information wise than subbing (as I do for my local schools here), as in will I learn more than just behavioral management? How much time does it take to complete the clinicals? What do I do if they assign me further away from my kids school and I can't drop them off and drive there to get there on time every morning, will the school be understanding because it's simply for clinicals?

Thank you in advance!! If you have answers to any of these I'd love to hear and hear about your experiences if you're willing to share. 🫶

Take the pre-assessment (final practice exam) and then study what you didn’t do well in. When ready, take the final. Am I missing something?

TLDR: I thought I could do student teaching at the school where I am already employed and am being told that’s not the case and now I feel screwed.

I feel like I’m going crazy. When I first started I swear the program was a dual special education and general education Master’s. Now it’s just special education.

Under the original program the clinicals and student teaching were split between sped and gen ed. Now there’s only hours for sped with a requirement for secondary level hours that I don’t remember being there. I ignored all that and pushed through and now I’m up to my advanced clinical application and they are telling me I can’t do a collaborative placement but I do not remember reading that anywhere. The clinical experience facilitator sent me this module for “Intro to Clinical Experiences” that doesn’t seem at all familiar even though I know I did the module. Did they change it? It feels like they have changed things without communicating it and acting like that’s how it always was or am I totally losing my mind? I’ve only been in the program for a year

This whole process has me feeling really discouraged and stupid. Is it just me? After a lot of trial and error, I finally have my physical fingerprint cards. But it was such a pain in the ass to get them, I'm really scared I'll send them to the wrong address or something stupid now.

Do I send them to American Databank? This is the address in the header of my order confirmation (It's the only address anywhere on the document):

American DataBank, L.L.C.
700 17th Street, 10th Floor,
Denver, CO 80202

Or to Colorado Fingerprinting:  

301 Kalamath St
Unit 101
Denver, CO 80223

Or neither? Where are people finding this information?

Guys I applied for advanced clinicals today and I did not have an option to put grade preference or school district preferences??? Is that normal ?? I swear I thought you could put your preferences.

Hi everyone,

I've finished all of my requirements for my licensing exams, early clinical, and all my coursework leading up to the application for advanced clinical. My application window, as of this post, is open until July 7th.

I live in Virginia, so I need a minimum of 50 hours for advanced clinicals and 60 days of student teaching with a mandatory two-week break between them. All my closest school districts go back between August 12th and August 18th. I've received two different perspectives from my program mentor as to why August or September is preferable. Earlier in my program, he said most schools don't like to take on student teachers during the first week or two of instruction, meaning I may not be able to log any time in August. He said more recently that my clinical placement coordinator and Northwest clinical neighborhood team could likely get me in somewhere during the first week of instruction at several schools, meaning I could finish faster.

I feel as though September would be the better option, but I would appreciate any other perspectives on this. My program mentor went on vacation and won't be back to discuss my application until July 6th, which is a pretty narrow window between our meeting and due date for the application.

I have a start date of Aug 1st. My application is complete, have been admitted and completed my commit to start and payment plan. Next step is orientation that will open on the 15th. Is there anyone that I can speak to get started earlier? Feel like I’m wasting time waiting for orientation.

I’m looking for other WGU student who have had their student refund stolen in Nelnet, and who are still waiting for an update from the WGU fraud team.

My MFA was set up, and I did not receive any suspicious emails. My refund was stolen minutes before it was supposed to be deposited, when hackers changed my bank account information, as well as my email and phone number. It was then routed to a dummy fraud account.

All I know is that Nelnet is trying to receive the funds back from the fraudulent account.

Aside from this, WGUs fraud team has been SO unhelpful. I am consistently the first one to reach out for an update, and when I do, I’m met with the most generic response.

It’s been almost 3 weeks since I was supposed to receive my refund.

I’m hoping we can all share the little information that we have, and potentially come up with a way to escalate the situation.

My concern is that my WGU tuition has already been paid, so their lackluster response is in regard to money that is considered “excess” and that does not benefit them in anyway.

Please share similar timelines and stories if you can relate. Hopefully we get an update soon!

I am currently taking D658 Planning Instructional Strategies for Meaningful learning. How can I pass the OA? Are there any tips or advice for this class? Any main focus points?

I am Enjoying my time here at WGU don’t get me wrong I have come across the occasional frustration but nothing to deter me from my Bachelor of Arts, Educational Studies in Elementary Education degree

but I do wish I would’ve heard about it straught out of high school or sooner than what I did because this option has never even come across my mind at all. I’m 32/f And that maybe Doing Sophia learning first then enrolling only because of my own personal goal of being done by march/April which I still think is doable but I just think that extra cushion would’ve accelerated me even more but I think I’m Still pacing I started march currently at 21cus I believe 98 is needed to graduate so I don’t think I’m in too bad of a place at 77cus more

but I’m wondering if you had to do it all over again what would you do?

So I had a clinical coach reach out to me but has responded to me since. I noticed in their email there was a link to schedule with clinical coach team.

So my question is, do you normally work with one coach or just a team of coaches?