I Graduated... Again! Master's Degree Secured

I did it. I finally did it. After years of dreaming, I've finally graduated with my master's degree! What makes this achievement even more special is, the journey was so much more than I expected. I worked with some incredible people, had some cool opportunities, and even received a few awards. It's a journey that wasn't perfect and had its hardships, but in the end, it was all worth it.

Firstly, I want to start by saying this journey wasn't easy. If you've seen my previous blog about getting accepted into graduate school, you may have noticed, it was the year of COVID-19. It was a time when everyone's lives changed. The pandemic led everyone to change their work and education lifestyles and quarantine at home, myself included. My job at the time wasn't something I could do from home so my hours changed to on-call. While I was home waiting for a call, I applied to graduate school. After working hard on my applications, I was accepted.

During the beginning of my master's pursuit, I focused on journalism courses. I was already working on news so I felt some journalism classes would benefit me. I started with a media writing course to familiarize myself with AP Style writing. My blog about Black women embracing their natural hair in news is actually one of my assignments! It was a very informative course and really did challenge the way I write.

I also took a mass media and diversity course, one of my favorites. In this class, we analyzed the representation of women and minorities in mass media. I get really passionate about how underrepresented people are portrayed in media so this course was right down my alley. Though some of the material was uncomfortable to sit through, it allowed me to speak from my own experience and learn to avoid harmful stereotypes.

Gif: Marvel Studios "Black Panther"

Next, I took communication theory and

media law courses. Media law became such an important course for me as it taught me about the body of law concerning the regulation of American media. And in my communication theory class, I spent pretty much the entire semester writing a research paper on people of color representation in Marvel films. Some of my focal films included "Black Panther" and "Doctor Strange." My research even got the attention of nonfans of Marvel who genuinely enjoyed the information.

I'm so grateful for the journalism information that I learned and the knowledge I gained, but something led me back to my one true love: film. As a film student, I took directing, cinematography, and documentary filmmaking courses, just to name a few. There's something about being behind the camera that I just love. That goes for actually setting up shots and giving direction. I even created one of my most favorite film projects as the cinematographer and director.

Something that I was not expecting to love as much as I did was screenwriting. I have always had a wild imagination and I have even written a few scripts when I was in middle school. But actually learning the correct way to screenwrite and getting back to using my imagination for bigger stories, sparked a passion in me that I didn't know I had. I couldn't wait to get to class and see what assignment I could challenge myself with.

Gif: HBO's "The Last of Us"

The film courses may have been very hands-on, however, the research didn't stop. During my film studies course, I wrote a 4,000-word research paper on how HBO's "The Last of Us" offers a deeper meaning on issues like climate change. That was the semester the show premiered on HBO so episodes were still airing as I was writing. I had to write in an informative way but also avoidant of spoilers as my professor was watching the show too but not caught up. That was a challenge but at least it was a pretty fun one.

Lastly, I had a couple of classes where I had to spend the entire semester creating my own short films. One semester, I created a narrative short film and the last semester I created a short documentary. Most film students would probably focus on one or the other for both short film projects, but I wanted to try both. It was such a stark contrast for both, but I didn't enjoy one over the other. I was just really glad to experience both. I can see myself going back to do both a narrative film and a documentary hopefully feature films in the future.

I can't forget to mention while I was pursuing my master's, I quickly became full-time at my job. So while I was able to do the journalism classes over Zoom, the film classes were on site. It did get hard some days to put in so much effort for both work and school. Some weeks were nonstop work, even on weekends. I also didn't graduate as quickly as I wanted to, but I'm glad I never gave up.

In the end, I received two awards highlighting my excellence in creativity, my name on a plaque on display in the halls I used to walk down, multiple film projects, knowledge gained and a master's degree to show for it!