Exhale

So, my interview was this past Friday. I drove home Thursday afternoon, picked up my mom and we started the drive to Daytona. The drive seemed endless. Its the same distance from my mom's house as is Tallahassee, but it takes like a half an hour extra for some reason. We got to Daytona around 5pm Thursday, checked into our hotel, and then drove to the college to find all of the rooms I had to be in in advance. It was really easy since I had been there before. Then we went to Olive Garden for dinner. Amazing, as usual. The mall was right next to our hotel, so my mom and I walked around a little, retail therapy helped me calm down some.
When I got back to the hotel, I started more preparation. I kept reading over the program website to be familiar with the courses, mapping of the program, and financial aid options. I was trying to plan out good questions to ask that couldn't be answered by the website. I wrote all of my notes down in a professional looking notebook then went to sleep.

The interview process started at 7:45am on Friday. I made it to campus fine, and even made friends with a girl who was walking in with me. I was surprised to see SO MANY people there. There were about 40 others being interviewed for my program and there were others being interviewed by phone or by skype. The program only has 16 spots available. Everyone was super nice though. The faculty were hilarious, the current grad students were really chill and helpful. They started with an information review, then we broke up into groups and started the interview process. My group went through three group interviews, then our individual interviews. The group interviews were awesome. It was sort of open ended questions/discussions basically. I felt like I asked good questions in the groups and that I stood out. The current graduate students ran the group interviews. My individual interview was okay I guess. The lady didn't ask me a whole lot about my experience like I thought she would. It was more so questions about what the program expects and if I think I could handle it.

We ended the day with lunch and more opportunities for questions. I left the campus at 1:30, picked up my mom and got on the road. I was so ready to just be home and relaxing. We got home at like 4:30. It was crazy. All in all, it was easier than I was expecting, but I still have no idea what to think about if I got in. There were so many other people for my competition. I should find out this week though. Now I just have to get through this week ad make it to spring break :)