Tammye Butler
Interview
- Q: How did you find your way to The Chicago School?
- A: I had planned to continue on to get my master's right after undergrad, but I was eight months pregnant when I graduated and well…a baby changes everything! You want to go right…but you have to go left. I just kept putting it off and putting it off and finally I just said, you can't put it off anymore. Plus, I love school, if I could earn a living as a student, I would.. Secondarily, there's the income potential. In social services you almost can't do anything without a master's. So, I started to research online programs.
When I looked more closely at The Chicago School, I was so impressed by the comments intermittently posted from faculty and staff. I also love the staff bio's; it made them real. What finally solidified my decision was the caption that read The Chicago School of Professional Psychology is the nation's leading nonprofit school dedicated exclusively to psychology and related fields. After viewing the "Approach" described on the web site, I was confident that I wanted to become a part of such a legacy. - Q: You work full-time, have adult children and are raising a teenager, take care of your disabled father and more… how do you do all that and manage to go to school?
- A: Oh my goodness. Think of a buffet in which there are so many choices to choose from. You select your favorites, add a few new items and despite how much of the entree you may consume you still make room for dessert. That's what The Chicago School is for me—dessert. With all the things in life I have on my plate, some favorites, some new items...I always make room for dessert. The flexibility of the program, the variety of students that have become my peers, the learning--all dessert.
To me being this busy isn't anything out of the ordinary. It helps that I'm a night owl. I love that there's flexibility. I can go to class at 1 in the morning. I can go at 3 in the morning. Whatever. Anywhere. - Q: So even though you're an online student, you are experiencing classroom interaction?
- A: There's more class interaction than I thought there would be. I'm loving it, having traveled while in the military I welcome the diversity of the ages, cultures, races, etc. It's truly wonderful to view different perspectives.
- Q: Do things come up in class that apply to your work life?
- A: I've been in the workforce for over 20 years so when they bring up scenarios, it's like, this happened to me. I can interject my own experiences and share with the class. I can share stories about when I've made mistakes, how I recovered from them, how I dealt with particular issues. What's great about it is my classroom peers really give me a lot of feedback about my experiences and I'm still able to learn from what happened way back when because I'm gaining different perspectives on the situations.
- Q: How would you like to make a difference?
- A: It's my personal belief that the business world now understands that what happens in our personal life affects what happens at work. They used to think, oh you can just come to work, work, don't worry about it, but I think they're realizing, OK, we really need to start looking at what is happening with people personally and get more in tune with merging those two. I'd like to help with that.
- Q: What drew you to psychology?
- A: Psychology chose me. I was headed for law school and one of my instructors said I had too much compassion for the law. He said he thought I was one of those people who wanted to fix stuff. I told him I was a psych minor and he said that's perfect. So it chose me.
- Q: So, what's next?
- A: I said when I turned 40, that's it, these next 40 years are gonna be a whole lot better than the first, and the first 40 were great!
My daughter was born in Memphis so I've stayed here pretty much for her, but she graduates next year. I was born and raised in Southern California. So I'm thinking, when I'm ready to pursue a doctorate I'll probably go to the LA campus. Back home.
