2005-11-01 00:00:00
Masters degree and mysterious phone call
Today during lunch there was a meeting for anyone interested in a masters degree program that could possibly be coming to CTC. Yes, you heard me, coming to CTC. It would be 5 8-week semesters per year with 1 class each semester. This would allow for completion of the degree in 2 years. Robert Morris University will send professors to CTC for each class and teach it on-site. I would have to walk 100 yards every Monday night to take a class. That is awesome. So after the meeting I went with Aaron to his building where we worked on various tasks, one of which was outlining what we thought the best degree program would be. See, here's the catch of this program, if you can call it a catch. There are basically 2 degree programs what RMU is ready to bring to CTC, IT Project Management and Information Management Systems. But we, as a group, have to choose which one we want to pursue. Once the degree is chosen, we then have to decide on the electives or specialization area, depending on the degree. Having an entire group coming to a single decision will be rough... So with the information we were presented with at the meeting, Aaron and I went to RMU's website to search for the curriculum of these two degrees.The IT Project Management degree has more of a focus on the business side of technology, with the opportunity to specialize in one of four areas: Accounting, Business, IMS, and E-Commerce. Don't be confused by the "specialization." That is just a replacement for electives. Instead of having the freedom to take any elective we want, in the IT Project Management degree we must pick a specialization area. For the IMS degree, it's more technical, but in place of the specialization it has the normal elective opportunities. Now you might be thinking, why is IMS it's own degree when it's a specialization area for the IT Project Management degree? We thought the same thing. So our pitch to the group is this...
Having management experience makes you more marketable to the world. Since the IT Project Management degree has that, it gets a +1. For those people who still want the technical classes, we can choose to make the specialization area of this degree IMS. That will satisfy everyone. The business people get their business, and the tech people get their tech. There is no reason to choose IMS as a whole degree when it's core courses are offered as a subset of the IT Project Management degree. So we are going to write this proposal and present it to the group when it is time to decide.
Because I was away from my desk for the second half of the day, when I returned I noticed my personal cell phone had 1 missed call. I checked the number and it was from somewhere I didn't recognize. I cleared the number and then my phone told me I had a voicemail. Since it was from an unknown number, I put it off until I got out to my vehicle. So while I was on the way home, I got out my phone and listened to the message. It was some lady who said she is looking to fill a position in Pittsburgh for an Infrastructure Architect. She found my resume online (don't ask me how, maybe she Google'd and found my site) and apparently my qualifications were good enough to receive the initial phone call. She left a callback number and said she was looking forward to hearing from me. I wanted to jump up and down, but that would have caused me to wreck, and that wouldn't be a good thing now would it? So tomorrow I will call her back and get some details. Maybe I won't even have to worry about this whole degree thing if I'm in Pittsburgh. Who knows?!?!
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