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[Music] hello Blue Jays and welcome to the nest stories about life after Manor College I am your host Kelly Peiffer vice president of marketing Communications and this is the best part of my day my hope is that this podcast will encourage inform and inspire you making you feel like at mayor College you belong here always did you know that mayor College now offers a practical nursing degree program started in 2023 the 70 credit program leads to an associate of science degree in practical nursing and prepares

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students to take the National Council lure Examination for practical nursing this program can be completed in 15 months and combines Hands-On lab and clinical experiences with general education courses it equips students with the knowledge and skills needed to work as LPN's or pursue a registered nurse RN degree l PN provide basic patient care under the supervision of RNs and doctors in various Health Care settings including hospitals nursing homes doctor's offices and so let's talk about what is

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the demand for an LPN so the demand for an LPN right now in the Greater Philadelphia area is pretty strong driven by factors such as an aging population the ongoing need for health care services numerous facilities including hospitals nursing homes healthcare agencies are constantly seeking out qualified LPNs and according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics the employment rate is projected to grow 3% from 2023 to 2033 projecting that about 54,000 openings for LPNs will remain open on average year over-year over the next 10

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years so there's certainly a lot of Need for LPN out there in the Philly area and at Manor we're really excited and um grateful to be offering an LPN program to hopefully fulfill some of those workplace um needs out there so having a career as an LPN lends itself to a lot of flexible work there's flexible shift options there's per diem work so this is a really good career if someone is looking to um have a flexible job with their life maybe they're a parent or a caregiver or they have other things going on in their life where they they

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need some flexibility in their job so being an LPN is one of those jobs that really has a lot of options so if you or someone you know wants to learn more about Manor's LPN practical nursing program I recommend you visit manor.edu and look into to get started today now I am honored to welcome today's alumni guest today's guest embodies dedication perseverance and the power of Education born and raised right here in Philadelphia in the Cheltenham area Our Guest is a proud graduate of Cheltenham high school earning an

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associate ass of Arts degree in Psychology from Manor College in 2012 while at Manor she found herself busy helping other students as a tutor and was a finalist for our prestigious mother josephat medal award after Manor she continued her education at Chestnut Hill College and we'll talk about further other education that she pursued now they are making a difference in the lives of Young Learners every day currently is a first grade teacher with the school District of Philadelphia working at Northeast Community Propel

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Academy please join me join me in welcoming a true Testament to the transformative power of Education a proud Manor College alumni and a passionate educator Janay Watts welcome Janay hi thank you for having me you are welcome it's a pleasure to talk to you today so kind of start us off by sharing with us how did you first find out about Manor College and why did you choose to attend so I found out about Manor through my sister who I believe at the time was a coach so her name was Sharia Sharia Watts she used to work at Manor um

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I think she was a cheerleading coach and I was having trouble um just going to school in general um I had a really rough time at Lincoln University for the first year and I dropped out so um and then I started working and she found Manor and she said you know what I think this would be a really good fit for you it's small um she said they they tend they cater to their students and I was like okay well I'll try it um and when I started I think I started my first class I absolutely fell in love with how small

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it was how um easy it was to get help when I needed the help because most big universities are kind of like figure it out you know and I'm I come from Cheltenham high school where it's it's small but it's not that small um so that's how I got there and I just I loved it I excelled there once I really started taking classes oh that's great that's great to hear that you felt you felt like it was like nurturing and if I needed help I could find help um and it wasn't too overwhelming so I think that's a really big area of concern when

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students are first going to college they like am I going to be able to find help and not feel bad about asking for help that's a really important thing that's great so you said that you started working and then came to Manor um I think that's actually pretty common for a lot of students to to take we some might call it a gap year couple Gap years if it's more than one but just like get your feet wet start working a little bit make some money and then go to college um is that kind of what what happened for you you kind of got out in

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the real world a little bit working yes um that's that's kind of what happened so I started working at Macy's and then it it wasn't no actually I'm I'm telling a story I worked at Best Friend's pet care for a good five years so best friends was over on ojk road or Eastern Road where Urban Air used to what Urban Air is now um so I worked there for 5 years and then um I got hurt and I ended up getting fired so um while I was working there I was also working at Manor um when I started going to Manor that's when I

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really started working at Manor as well but um I wasn't I wasn't fulfilled when I was just working at Best Friend's pet here um I was missing something and I wasn't really happy and that's when my sister told me about Manor and I decided to go so I Contin to still work there while I was going to school and then picked up another job at Manor sure sure yeah well that that's great that you um not great that you weren't fulfilled but great that you were able to like see that in yourself and realize it and be like okay

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what can I do how do I how do I better myself and how do I kind of scratch that itch a little bit um and and so many of our students work while they're in in college I the stats around 85% of our students are working while being a student and we believe close to half of them are working full-time so it is super common for students to you know school's not the only thing going on in their life right which kind of makes sense you know um so so talk to me about what was it like being a Manor student

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What were what was kind of take us back what was it like for you what would a day kind of look like in in your life during that time time um let's see when I started I had to take the computer science class that was one of the first classes that I had to take and when I started taking the class I'm like okay this could be easy I'm pretty tech savvy this isn't hard but then I realized once she started um her name was Carolyn Wilson I believe um once she started teaching us about Excel everything my grade started plummeting

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and she looked at me and she said it's not as easy as you thought it would be huh and I was like no it's not um but she ended up like really showing me how to I'm still horrible XL it it didn't change anything but um she ended up like helping me and then um my grades went back up but that's how it was in every class if you needed the help and your professor saw that you needed the help they helped they didn't just let you sink um and then the next semester she asked me if I wanted to tutor her kids and that's I became a

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tutor oh that's cool yeah definitely I think um I think there's a good lesson there from Carol Wilson talking about how like it's not as easy as you think and if you need the help we're going to get you the help but obviously you must have did pretty well if you're able to be a tutor so don't beat yourself up too much but um Excel is hard but it's a good life skill to have you know everyone kind of uses it at some point whether you're making a spreadsheet for work or making a budget for your own

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personal finances it's something that we all kind of should have some kind of working knowledge in so uh talk to us about what was your relationship like with Manor professors and kind of what influence did they have on you they were very friendly um very motivating a lot of times they could a lot of times they saw something in me I didn't see in myself so um my psychology professor she would see the work that I would turn in and she would just nudge and say you can do a little bit better you can do a little

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bit better and she was right I could do a little bit better um but they were very they were your cheerleaders they were always your cheerleaders and I think that's kind of that that's what helped a lot that's what pushed me a lot that's what motivated me a lot to finish because I didn't think for a long time that I would even finish school at all that's great that's so cool so now I mean you're able to kind of reflect back on professors that you had who were en encouraging you and motivating you and

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seeing those things in you and now are you able to see that in your own students and kind of are you able to kind of you know talk about that a little bit that's kind of a reflection um are you able to kind of take that forward with you yes so right now I teach first grade um I looped with the students that I had last year in kindergarten so um when I see my kids struggling like we're doing well this really hard math and if you know math now it's not the math that we learned when we were younger um and a lot of times you I see

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students that feel like they can't do it so you know all students need is just a little a little cheerleader they just need a little nudge a little love and a little push and they can do it so I think what I got from Manor the motivation the push the cheerleaders that's kind of what I embody now because I've realized as an adult that's all these children need is just a a cheerleader that's it right little love little push but um having that having you there you know you were a kindergarten teacher last year now

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you're a first grade teacher so having those kids have like two years of uh Miss watts is pretty cool you know like that that's really neat and pretty too I would say a lot of students probably don't have the same elementary teacher two years in a row and that's going to have an impact on them that's for sure going to have an impact on their life which is really cool for you to to see that so talk to me a little bit about what was it like um going through you graduated from Manor with an associates

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and then you transferred and kind of got more education what has your education Journey been like and as you kind of think back what um how did how did Manor play A Part as the foundation to more education and more degrees and Stu so Manor showed me that I I can accomplish things um and once I got that push I just for the first I want to say like two years I just tried to keep going but you know life happens things happen and I had to stop I had to take a break um and so I graduated from Manor I went to

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Chestnut Hill um Chestnut Hill was really hard it was hard it was also like okay I'm back at a bigger school they're not as um nurturing as Manor so that was something that I had to adjust to um but once you know life happened I had to stop going to school I ended up working again full-time and I became a early childhood education teacher so I worked in child care for a very long time until after I had my son and by the I think once he was two I went back um but then it was it was a online platform so it

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wasn't in the class so that was kind of like a different um setting for me so it was more so teach yourself but um as long as I knew that I could accomplish my goals and I I knew that I could do it because I did it that's all I needed was just to keep going because I know I can do it right that's that's such good sometimes like that self motivation like self talk to yourself like um you were saying how like everyone need a little cheerleader in your life but like you also need to be your own little

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cheerleader you know um so that's really really cool to hear that you kind of knew I know I can do it it's just a matter of like the timing the finances the you know you need a little bit of um space in your schedule to like go online and and do classes and do some readings and all those things because it it takes a lot and you know you had a you had a baby in that time too so like obviously give yourself Grace for how much you have accomplished over um you know these these 12 years or so it's it's really

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impressive and major kudos to you for for earning earning three degrees and coming so far in your journey it's really cool um so talk to me about just you're you're obviously a passionate educator why why do you think um why do you think education is so important especially for the little guys that you're teaching I think you know we talk a lot about higher ed and college and um I don't often get to talk to elementary school teachers so talk to me about you know why is it so important for for the little ones to be pouring

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into them like you are there our future those are who are going to be responsible for taking care of the world when we're older um not only do I pour into them I pour into my son I pour into any child that comes into my path because it's so important that these children get the nurturing they get the love they get the education they they get whatever they they need to be successful adults um not only that but they need kindness they need to learn like the social emotional piece um nowadays you see a lot of violence going on and even

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in schools um and we don't you don't see now you see a lot of more you have you see a lot more schools teaching the social emotional piece because they have emotions just like we do so I feel like that's why it's it's important to pour into them and to make sure they get what they need because they're responsible for us when when we get older well they get older I'm sorry yeah we get older and they also get older so you're right there certainly our future um and I think teaching them like social

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emotional kindness and respect and dignity and ethics is really important particularly when they're little because like that's the foundation they're just going to build from when they get to high school and middle school and um when when the education gets harder but if they have those core kind of values to them that's really important you know a big part of our our mission at Manor College is the last line in the mission it's uh to serve to to educate our students who are going to serve Society

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effectively and compassionately and I just as I'm hearing you talk I'm like Janay is doing that she is she is literally living out the Manor College Mission you're serving others you know first graders kindergarteners your son whoever's in your path really and you're preparing them to to serve society and kind of pay it forward with compassion um so thank you for doing that thank you for kind of being a Living testament to our mission here at the college that's really cool to see um that your story

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got intertwined with ours back in 2012 so kind of as we we finish up here Janay what advice would you give to Manor college students who are right now they're on Spring Break um you know hopefully they're catching up on their rest and any assignments that they're missing but you just kind of need that extra push to get to the end of the semester who might be feeling a little little weary um what advice would you give them be kind to yourself give yourself some Grace things happen for a reason you can do

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it those were the key things that I needed to accomplish my goals and to still accomplish my goals I still have to give myself Grace I still have to understand that things will happen when they happen um is this is not a race we're not running a race we're not on anybody else's time um be your own cheerleader it's good to have people around you that celebrate you and push you and cheer you on but you have to be your own cheerleader for most of the way um that's that's pretty much it because those are the things that I live by

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every day yeah that that's so great and I think spoken so true and regardless of what like your situation is right now if you're a college student if you're um a new parent if you're a working professional wherever you are in life like that's good advice in in general so thank you for sharing that with us um be kind to yourself really I think struck me the most and and also like it is run your own race you know we're not competing against others it's on your own time life happens it might take you

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longer you might get there shorter you know just give yourself the grace to to still get get to goal in your own time that is that's really good to hear um Janay thank you so much for being with us today I've really enjoyed our conversation and I hope our listeners also enjoyed and we inspired by you like I was oh thank you thank you for tuning in today if you like what you heard listen And subscribe on Spotify or YouTube and stay up to date with all new episodes of The Nest by following Manor College on Instagram at Manor College

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that's a wrap on another episode of The Nest stories about life after Manor College remember Blue Jays you belong here always [Music]