毕业生焦点:乔尔·“巴里”·卡普
2018年12月15日
乔尔·“巴里”·卡普
贝琪·纳特著
乔尔·“巴里”·卡普's undergraduate journey mirrors many others at bet8体育娱乐入口. He's the child of a military household who settled in Norfolk; he took a break between starting and finishing his degree; and he's a first-generation college student.
But Carp differs from his classmates in one very distinct way: he's 76 years old.
Carp received his bachelor's in political science and geography during ODU's Commencement Ceremony Saturday at the Ted Constant Convocation Center. And though it's taken more than 50 years - he took his first class at the University in 1967 - he never stopped believing he would finish what he started.
“我知道我心中有一个目标. 我知道这是我想做的事情. And I knew it was something I could do,鲤鱼说.
出生于康涅狄格州布里奇波特.11岁时，卡普搬到了诺福克. 军人父亲的儿子, his mother served as his primary motivation to go to college after he graduated from Maury High School in Norfolk in 1959.
"When I was young she'd say, 'You know, I'm the only one who graduated from high school.' I thought, 'I think I'm going to do you one better.'"
1967年，卡普开始在ODU工作.
"In those early years it was just getting the fundamentals like English and math,鲤鱼说. "But even then, I knew that history or geography had to be included in my program some way."
He left the University in 1971 for a state health care job to help support his young family.
"I preached the gospel of Medicaid for 20 years,鲤鱼说. He spent about another 10 years as a patient accounts manager in various hospitals.
While working in the field of finance, for pleasure he read volumes on history and politics. So when he returned to school a degree in the field was a natural.
是什么让世界运转? 钱，”卡普说. "Columbus would never have gotten out of the boat without money from Isabela and Ferdinand."
While he did take classes in the 1980s at Virginia Wesleyan College, Carp ultimately returned to ODU in 2012 after he retired from the health care business.
那时，他的四个孩子都已长大成人. His oldest son even graduated from ODU in political science and geography - the same major Carp ultimately would find himself pursuing years later.
"I told my son I was following in his footsteps,鲤鱼说. “我的孩子们都认为这是另一回事."
The campus had changed considerably in the decades since Carp had taken any courses, but he said mixing with the younger students was the "easiest part about the program."
"They listened when I had something to say because I lived through a lot of the events that we were learning about in the books,他说.
卡普说他也从同学那里学到了东西.
"I'm conservative and very often the students who spoke would offer a liberal perspective,鲤鱼说. "I was able to glean some ideas and concepts I wouldn't have ordinarily thought about.
"Some of the comments enabled me to understand that there is a different point of view that may have some interlocking aspects to mine rather than one that's totally contrary."
Carp hopes to use that perspective in the next phase of his education: graduate school. He said he'd like to end up teaching others about how civilizations can learn from historical patterns.
"In a way, you could say I was teaching from day one. I was helping providers figure out how to get paid correctly, so when I walked into a room with a hundred people in it, you can believe they hung on every word I said. I thought 'Maybe this teaching thing isn't so bad.'"
Though Carp continues to look ahead, he is still taking time to revel in the present.
"When I started, I saw in the distance this goal. Now that it's been achieved, I feel a certain effervescence about it,鲤鱼说. “会有很多情绪. It's something I look forward to in every way."
要了解更多关于Carp的信息，请参阅即将出版的 君主杂志.
