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Sunday, May 27, 2007
Nearly 30 years later, mother of 5 gets that degree
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Many a night she felt too tired to go on.
Adie Shimandle of Snellville toughed it out, though.
To do otherwise, to give in to fatigue, would mean deferring a decades-old dream, long past due.
So she didn’t, and on May 12, this married mother with kids graduated with a bachelor’s degree from the University of Georgia Gwinnett campus.
I first met her in 2003, shortly after she had returned to school. For her, it had been a while. Nearly 30 years ago. She got her associate’s degree from Manatee College in Bradenton, Fla. Then, college stopped.
Hers is a familiar tale. You know the script. Women wed, have kids, focus on raising them, sometimes while working, postpone personal goals. Solders the family soul.
It’s what Shimandle did.
She and Rick married 29 years ago. They had five kids. Her job as project manager for a broadcasting firm brought the family to Atlanta in 1980.
Eventually, the company decided to relocate its executive offices to Miami. The family chose to stay put, and for Shimandle, it was on to the next job. She worked for Nortel Networks, a telecommunications firm, for more than 20 years. It downsized in 2002, and she lost her job.
It’s around that time she decided to get her bachelor’s degree.
She told me that she didn’t know if she would have been able to go back to school if UGA had not been offering classes in Gwinnett. I guess she has a point. Having a satellite campus of the state’s flagship school has its benefits.
But Shimandle had some advantages, too: family, dedication, desire.
And as of this month, she has succeeded, all the while juggling motherhood with her job as a national manager who handles high-end donors for Atlanta-based CARE USA, an organization fighting global poverty.
This spring, she graduated cum laude with a bachelor’s of science degree in education, instructional psychology, training and technology. Shimandle is qualified in designing Web sites, graphic art and other impressive stuff.
On May 12, she attended the UGA commencement exercises in Sanford Stadium. Two days earlier, she was one of two student speakers at a local reception for UGA graduates who earned their 2007 degrees in Gwinnett.
It couldn’t have been easy. But when Shimandle enrolled in school back in June 2003, she didn’t do it alone. She had five kids and a husband who cried when he heard her speech at the reception.
When she was in school and would start to whine, worry and stress, her kids would remind her of the three “gets.”
Get it out. Go ahead and whine. Get over it. You still have to complete the work. Get on with it. The sooner you finish, the sooner you can stop whining.
“Sometimes I would be sitting there at 1 o’clock in the morning at my computer,” she told me. “My head would hit my chest. …You just want to go to sleep.”
At the time, she wasn’t the only Shimandle under pressure. Three daughters were, too. Charleaze finished grad school with honors at Piedmont College. Alexandria earned a chemistry award at Georgia Perimeter College.
And then there’s Teanna Wilson, married, the second-oldest daughter. She’s a “first honor grad,” a biology major who graduated in 2007, too.
Mom and daughter. Same school, different campuses. Same year. Sweet.
Shimandle spoke about her journey in her speech.
“It’s never too late to fulfill the dream of obtaining a bachelor’s degree or entering grad school,” she said. “You’re never too old to learn, and never too young to appreciate learning from those who have gone before you.”
• Rick Badie’s column appears on Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. Contact him at 770-263-3875 or e-mail rbadie@ajc.com.
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