{"id":362,"date":"2014-09-23T20:37:30","date_gmt":"2014-09-23T20:37:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/?p=362"},"modified":"2014-09-29T17:52:25","modified_gmt":"2014-09-29T17:52:25","slug":"from-stay-at-home-mom-to-media-specialist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/2014\/09\/23\/from-stay-at-home-mom-to-media-specialist\/","title":{"rendered":"From Stay at Home Mom to Media Specialist"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Gina_Full<\/a>Gina Drellack
\nBagley, MN
\nMajor: Elementary Education
\nBSU Graduate: 2007
\nRoute: DLiTE<\/a><\/p>\n

Gina Drellack was a stay-at-home mom until her youngest of two children started kindergarten at Bagley Elementary School. She soon began working as the school\u2019s library media para-professional. That\u2019s when she first aspired to become a school librarian.<\/p>\n

\u201cI loved the students; I loved the books; I just loved the whole thing,\u201d Drellack recalls. \u201cThat\u2019s when I decided to go back to school.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then recently divorced, she also wanted more financial stability for her children, but she didn\u2019t want to sacrifice her time with them while earning her degree.<\/p>\n

\u201cDLiTE allowed me to keep my full-time job, be a mom and keep my life,\u201d Drellack explains. \u201cI would get up at 4 a.m. before the kids got up so I could study and still be mom when they got home from school. I couldn\u2019t have done it without the DLiTE program. It helped enhance my life instead of getting in the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Drellack also appreciated the support of her teacher mentor, a required partner in the DLiTE program. Mentors help students build professional networks and introduce them to a variety of student-teaching experiences throughout their studies.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou start and finish each semester on campus with face-to-face instruction, but every single class connects you with your mentor teacher,\u201d she says. \u201cThat person helps you connect with other teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n

Drellack finished the six-semester program in five semesters. The accelerated pace is not something she would recommend. However, she wanted to be a candidate for the Bagley media specialist job that was opening up. BSU administrators worked with her to accommodate her timeline.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe instructors are phenomenal,\u201d Drellack says. \u201cThey understand that this is real life.\u201d<\/p>\n

She has since completed her library certification at another institution and is working on her master\u2019s degree. Best of all, she has her dream job as a media specialist for the Bagley School District.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnline learning has been the vehicle that transformed my life,\u201d Drellack says. \u201cFrom where I started to where I am now is a huge success story.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cDLiTE allowed me to keep my full-time job, be a mom and keep my life.”<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":356,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":507,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362\/revisions\/507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/356"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bemidjistate.edu\/academics\/distance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}