Leonard’s life had seemed to be on track. He went to college, got a degree, and a job … but life can go in unexpected directions. “I got married, things happened, the pandemic derailed everything, I was in a financial bind, and then I had to restart all over again,” he said. “My plans got just thrown out the window, and I was trying to rebuild my life.”
He was working odd jobs as he looked for a way forward. He ”just stumbled across” Calbright, and remembers liking what he saw.
“I tried going back to a traditional college and realized maybe it is just not right for me,” he said. Calbright was different. It’s free, and that was appealing. It is also focused, and Leonard thought that was what he needed.
“Calbright doesn’t try to do everything. It offers a limited number of programs that are mostly tech-related and career focused, so I thought: okay, this could be a really good opportunity,” he said. “And as soon as I started I realized, ‘oh yeah, this is a pretty cool virtual campus. It’s definitely geared toward people studying online, they’ve done a really good job.’ I was actively posting things on Slack and it caught other people’s attention, so I was able to make connections. I found a community.”
Leonard enrolled in Calbright’s program in Customer Relationship Management (CRM) Platform Administration, which teaches students how to use and manage systems like Salesforce that companies around the world use to track their important connections and interactions. “It was not as difficult as I thought it would be,” he said. “What I love about Calbright is the fact that they give you extra tools, extra resources, like LinkedIn Learning. We could use that for free. That’s a major advantage of being a student at Calbright.”
He completed the CRM program in three months, but “I realized that CRM isn’t really for me,” he said.
That was disappointing, but there was good news: He hadn’t spent a dime, let alone gone into debt. And he liked Calbright, so he enthusiastically enrolled in another program, Data Analysis.
He completed that program in another three months, and now is planning to start working with Calbright’s Career Services team to find a job in the industry.
“I’m optimistic,” he said. “What’s good about Calbright is that they provide this path, where you know what you need to do. And they offer a lot of support. That’s the most important thing.”
But, he said, students need to know that all the help in the world can’t substitute for personal motivation. “Students must participate,” he said. “Calbright gives them the path, but if they don’t use Slack, or they don’t respond to their Success Counselor or their instructors, then it’s not going to happen. Like anything else, you have to put in the effort. But if you do, there’s a tremendous amount of support here.”
