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posted 09/25/06 by Anthony Governanti Continuing Education

So I've taken the plunge back into the world of education and have enrolled in the University of Phoenix to complete my undergraduate degree. I'm studying to get my Bachelor's degree in Business Management, and my first class begins tomorrow. I'm very excited, but also trying to be honest with myself about this commitment, as I'll need to fit at least 10-15 hours a week of study and class time into an already over-booked schedule. But on the upside, even though my background up to this point in my life has been highly technical, I feel that having some business experience will help me understand the other side of this industry a little better.

Ok, so I don't think I mentioned this in my Bio, but somehow I've managed to get to where I am today (granted, its probably not as far as I'd like to think it is) without a bachelor's degree. I currently have two associates degrees in applied science from Vermont Technical College. The original plan was to get just one, in Architecture, but I quickly realized at the time the my passion for CAD and my under-developed art skills really didn't point to a successful future designing buildings (I found myself having heated debates with my drafting professors about the merits of manual drafting, and they often ended with me saying something like "just give me 15 minutes with AutoCAD, and I'll give ya perfect lettering", and me throwing my Leroy template across the table and storming out for some fresh air!). But, since the two programs at VTC were very similar (they shared a lot of core classes) I decided after my freshmen year to make the switch over to Civil Engineering Technologies.

So now you're probably thinking - what the heck does this have to do with CIvil 3D? Well, not much to be honest, but then again, not everything I post up here will be. In this case I will tie this bit of information into an Autodesk related story by explaining exactly why I wound up getting both degrees.

See at the time (1996) AutoCAD had released R13, the first release on Windows (no comments on that one please, we all lived through those dark times, and its something better left alone). OK the exact date might not be correct, but this is when my school made the switch anyway. The powers that be in admissions at the time had it in their head that any of the CAD classes I had during my freshmen year would not transfer from the Architectural degree to the Civil degree because of the new version. This meant that I would have to take the Freshmen CAD classes again, only in the Civil track, and that meant a third year of classes in order to get everything in synch. So since I already had one year under my belt for the Arch degree, why not just finish it off AND go ahead with the Civil classes to get that degree as well.

SO there you have it, Autodesk was in my destiny even back then, when I had no idea what my future would hold, and how things would circle back to Autodesk playing a role in my life again.

Well, enough of my rambling for now, but I hope you find it interesting; its one of those fate things, you never realize what an effect a decision like that can have on your life; for me it was a pretty monumental thing, because if it weren't for me switching to that Civil Degree, wouldn't have started working for civil engineering firms, where I eventually met my wife, I wouldn't have gotten a job at Autodesk in Civil support, and I wouldn't be here today blogging about my Civil 3D thoughts and opinions.

Pretty cool huh?

Till Next Time,
Cheers,
AG

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