Full Sail University

Date: Dec 11 2010
Major: Other (This Major's Salary over time)
I attended Full Sail ?04-?05 for there Recording Arts program with the hopes of an education in audio production and most importantly preparation to sell myself to potential employers based on my strengths. I worked extremely hard durning the 13 months of the program. Do to my lack of knowledge and inexperience in this field going into the program, I decided to strive to reach certain goals that would show my strengths. My goals where to get A?s and B?s and keep 100% attendance.

At the end of the coarse I was able to meet both of these goals even with there policies. If you are 15 min late, your cell phone rings in class or your out of the room for 13 min or more, you are marked 2 hrs out. I was never late, never missed a day and my cell phone was always off in class. It was not easy. I made it early everyday, even in situations where there was traffic or I was sick, broke, starving and exhausted.

At the end of the program I noticed that I was marked 2 hrs out for the last class we had. This has happened before and I was cretin it was just an error. I made an appointment with the instructor to try to get this resolved.

There where two instructors from this class at the meeting. I sat down and said that I was marked 2 hrs out but that I made it to my labs and classes on time so I figured it might me an error. Immediately one of them said we don?t make mistakes. He then pulled out a piece of paper and said yep ? My Name 2 hrs out, left class to use cell phone. I said, ? This doesn't make since, I wouldn?t jeopardize my attendance to make a phone call. This infuriated the instructor who stood up and said are you calling me a liar? I was shocked and attempted to explain the situation but I was told to get the hell out of the office. At this point they where standing up and pulled on my back pack loop forcing me to stand. They where both in my face as if they where going to fight me. Holding back tears, I tired again to explain that I used the restroom that day and I took my cell phone to keep track of the time so that I wasn?t out longer then the 13 min. Before I could explain this one of them yelled at me loud enough for others in near by cubicles to turn there heads to see what was going on. He yelled to get out of his office again while turning me around by my shoulders then pushed me towards the door. I left in tears.

I brought this incident to one of the counselors or someone there who dealt with issues such as this. She advised me that there is nothing I can do and that he is a ?Top Dog? there. ? Its his word against mine? she explained. I mentioned the security cameras surely captured it and mentioned that this is not the policy, that my cell phone was off in the room and never rang. She let me know there was no hope of getting this fixed.

This didn?t seem right at all and was devastating to me. Not only was it an assumption that I left to use my phone, they never asked me about it and physically put there hands on me which seemed wrong in many ways.

I sat in the front row, two feet in front of the instructors desk so thats why he was able to see me take my phone from my bag. I know someone else that had 100% attendance and we where almost identical which our grades. He ended up missing a lab because he misread the schedule. They let him make up the lab and keep his perfect attendance. The incident that happen to me also happen to someone else around the same time so it was not an isolated incident.

At graduation I had to watch my friend who missed a lab, except his award for perfect attendance with great applause. I sat there with no awards, no acknowledgment of what I achieved other then the degree.

This was devastating to me to say the least.

My biggest selling point of being 100% reliable was taken from me. They took that form me because now I don?t have the award and I am only 99.8% reliable. There are places like Skywalker ranch I wanted to apply to but was told from day one that they only except applications from students that have 100% attendance. This was the reason I worked so hard to achieve this. I don?t have the experience others have and this was my standout accomplishment to give me confidence in interviews and in selling myself to employers. This is what I paid then to help me with and they took it from me. When my job placement rep left a message, I couldn?t call him back. I am so upset with the School, I have not been able to call them about there job placement program and or audit classes.

Not only did I feel they assaulted me robed me of what I needed to confidently find a job in this field. The program pushes you through the program as one instructor termed, ? A potato chip factory. Some of them would give answers to the test questions for the mid term and finial as the corse training so essentially your not learning, your just getting the info you need to pass.

After graduation I didn?t know what to do. I was lost and scared to apply anywhere. To this day, 5 years later, I am still disillusioned and traumatized.