Stefanie Wilcox |Photo Submitted by Stefanie Wilcox
Stefanie Wilcox left her job as a business analyst to go back to college for the third time.
Becoming a teacher has always been Wright State student Stefanie Wilcox’s dream, but the responsibilities of being a parent and paying bills led her to taking a different job. As a business analyst and project coordinator with UPS at the Dayton airport, she made more money than she would teaching.
During her time at the airport, Wilcox balanced working a full-time job, caring for two kids and taking classes for her degree in English. At first she accomplished this by taking weekend and night classes. Eventually, she had to extend her lunch break to take day classes.
“I’d come to take a class at lunch, go back to work and then come back to school to take my class, and then I would go home. So sometimes I wouldn’t see my kids for two or three days because of how my schedule was.”
Stefanie Wilcox
Her busy schedule meant Wilcox’s time was split largely between the job she hated and precious time with her family.
Currently, Wilcox’s husband is their only source of income. He works a full-time job that makes it difficult for the whole family to come together.
Wilcox’s children are 13 and 11 and often Wilcox isn’t able to spend as much time with them as she would like. Her daughter is on the swim team, and Wilcox is not able to come to her meets due to classes.
Similarly, her son isn’t used to her absence either, which is why Wilcox and her husband have established family-only weekends.
“Weekends, we don’t do homework because it’s family time. We’ve really learned how to make our time with our family quality since we didn’t have a huge quantity of time to be together,” said Wilcox.
The long drives and busy schedule were not what Wilcox had in mind when she first thought of work.
Originally Wilcox wanted to be a teacher. Ever since she was a teen, Wilcox has loved kids and helping them. She often babysat for neighbors, which is where she first thought of being a teacher.
The interest continued into high school when she asked to shadow a fifth-grade teacher. She also volunteered to teach math at an elementary school.
Despite her love for teaching, Wilcox was uncertain about how financially smart the decision would be. She had a good-paying job where she had worked for over a decade.
She had already gone to college twice, once for associates in political science from Sinclair in 2006, and once for a bachelor’s in English at Wright State in 2012.
Wilcox worked full time while pursuing her bachelor’s degree and almost chose the ILA degree she wanted. She had deliberated between a general writing, technical writing or Integrated Language Arts specialization.
The problem was the specialization would have required her to quit her job to do student teaching. Eventually, she chose to keep her job and go with general writing to accommodate her schedule.
At 39 years old, going back to school would mean taking on more debt but doing what she loves.
“I was using my bachelor’s degree every day but I hated my job, I was miserable. And I always said if I could go back to school and get my ILA degree I would totally do it,” Wilcox said.
Wilcox’s husband was a great support to her during this time. He would help where he could, often picking up and dropping off their kids.
Even after completing her English degree, being a full-time employee wore on Wilcox. Although she made good money as a business analyst, the job was not what she wanted to do.
Her chance to get her ILA degree came in June 2021, when she was laid off after working at UPS for over a decade.
After being laid off she wondered if she should pursue her dream of becoming a teacher.
Eventually, Wilcox ended up interviewing for two different jobs as a business analyst. Both interviews went well, but she kept going back to college in the back of her mind.
“I was going back and forth like do I continue following this career path I hate or do I follow the path and become a teacher like I’ve always wanted to do. So it was like this real struggle because financially, this was the stupidest decision I could have made. Because we still have no income on my side and I’m taking on extra debt,” said Wilcox.
Wilcox spoke with her husband about her decision and he said he would support her whatever choice she made. With his support, Wilcox decided to wait and see how the interviews went.
After weeks of not hearing back, Wilcox took it as a sign she was not meant to continue as a business analyst. She made the decision to come back to college for the third time, getting her second Wright State degree.
She was readmitted in 2021, this time for the Integrated Language Arts for Adolescent and Young Adults program, which would allow her to teach once she graduates.
Wilcox enjoys her classes, though she still has to find a balance between being a parent and a full-time student. Her dual roles as student and parent are both something she loves, and one may help the other.
“Students who are parents bring an additional perspective into the classroom when we are learning about the teaching of English language arts. They are looking at things not only from the student perspective and reflecting on the teacher perspective, but they are also looking at the possible strengths or challenges of certain methods and materials from the parent perspective,” said Angela Johnson, Professor and Program Director of ILA.
For Wilcox, finally being able to get her ILA degree is fulfilling a lifelong dream of giving back.
“I have to feel like I’m making a contribution and doing some good, and as a teacher, there’s going to be at least one student in the next 25 years that I am making an impact on their life. And that is exactly what I need to feel like I have done something fulfilling,” said Wilcox.
