Enrolling at TAFE:

While I was on my Christmas break from work, I would check my email daily waiting for a response from the TAFE teacher to find out what day my test would be.
I realised that the teacher would probably take a while to reply as I knew that the TAFE holidays had not finished yet.
On my second day back at work, I finally got a response. The email said that I MUST be at the TAFE by 1pm the following day!
I called my employer to let them know, and was told that it wouldn't be a problem. Luckily they had known for a while that I was waiting to find out what day the test would be.
When I had first enquired about the course a few months beforehand, I had asked the TAFE teacher what the test would involve, so that I would be able to prepare myself a little. She informed me that the test would be on current affairs and, also, they would provide some information on which I would have to write a short news story, no longer than 250 words.
I knew that I would have no trouble writing the news story, but I was a little concerned about the whole current affairs side of things. I had never really been very interested in the news or anything like that (until now).
As soon as I found out, I started to record and watch the news every day, and I now also read a lot about the news etc. on the internet.
I spent the morning of the test watching the news, and preparing myself to head to the TAFE to sit the test.
I had found out that there were two separate TAFE campuses. I only knew where one campus was. I needed to head to the south campus, but there was no signage anywhere stating which campus I was actually on.
I was starting to get a little worried as it was coming very close to 1pm. The last thing I wanted to do was make a bad impression by being late.
I had tried to give myself plenty of time to find the campus and my room, but everything seemed to take  so much longer than I had expected.
Once I had finally found parking (which was a mission in itself), I made my way into the TAFE. I was about to be late, and I had no idea where I was going, so I was starting to panic a little.
When I got inside there was a big information desk set up, as all TAFE enrolments were happening that day. I told the man at the desk what campus, block and room I was after, and he informed me that I was on the north campus, so I needed to cross the road and walk down to the south campus.
By now it was about 12.55pm and I thought for sure that I would be late for the test. I was really not looking forward to walking into a room full of people staring at me.
Once I walked through the gates of the south campus, I had to ask two girls if they could point me in the right direction to find the room that I was after. I was really surprised to find that there was really no signage around anywhere. The whole place was very confusing.
After finally finding the block that I was after, I now had to find my room. As I walked into block G, there was another information desk set up, so I asked the man at the desk if he could point me to my room. Luckily it was right in front of us, so all I had to do was walk in.
When I walked in, I was relieved to find that I was right on time, and there were still no teachers in the room. We waited there for about half an hour before the teachers closed the door and started explaining about the course.
When it finally came time to do the test, I was nervous. I thought for sure that I would know none of the answers to the questions that I would be asked. Then, I took a deep breath and reassured myself that I would do fine. I also remembered the words of my boyfriend Mat, who had wished me luck that morning and told me that I had nothing to worry about.
Writing the news story came very easy for me, and I found that I did actually know most of the answers to the questions that I was asked.
Once the test was over, it was time to have them marked. This was actually the most nerve-racking part of the day.
One-by-one I watched people get up and have one-on-one interviews with the teachers to find out whether they got into the course or not.
It felt like hours had passed before it was finally my turn, and I was so happy when I found out that I had been accepted into the course. I got given my timetable, and I start my course on 6/2/12.
After realising that I only had a week to figure out where my money was going to come from for the next year, I decided to go and see one of the TAFE counsellors to find out what my options were.

Lela xx