God, prayer, discernment, college!

So you may be able to guess what I am going to talk about in this post just from my title. I know I have talked about college before but now being a senior in High School its a BIG subject in my life!

Last night I attended a College Night program to get a feel for what kind of colleges I could go to in the area where I live. Some of it was kinda depressing because I found out that if I do want to be a Pharmacist (like a FOR SURE thing... still lots of prayer going on at home) I will have to go to a University and let me tell ya they are not exactly affordable (we are talking between $16-27,000 a year!!!).

Shortly after I had arrived (I went with my wonderfully supportive father who gave me a lot of good advice of what colleges to talk to) a young woman walked up to me and my dad and asked me if she could have a couple minutes of my time.
I said OK thinking she was going to tell me something about a college she is representing but she had nothing to do with colleges.
She asked me if I could be a Christmas season model for Ambercrombie and Fitch! Now for those of you who may not know me very well, I do not support or purchase items from Ambercrombie and Fitch for several reasons, the biggest being that they have very inappropriate advertising.
I kindly told her that I am not interested and she told me that if I changed my mind, I could come in to any of their stores to sign up (like that would ever happen!).
If she had been working for American Eagle or Kohls or even JcPenneys I would have been more interested but definitely NOT for Ambercrombie and Fitch!
I was flattered though. Its funny too because my friend Nicole was just telling me the other day at LW that I could be a model too! lol
I don't think God has modeling in my future though. Besides, how can I be a light in the world as a model?

Well back to colleges.
I found out that no colleges in my state (at least that I know of) have a program to be a Pharmacist Technician so right now its either full in or nothing.
I did find out that if I do go to a college to be a pharmacist, their are 3 schools to choose from that would be best (all three are universities... go figure) one of which I would never attend just because they don't have a good reputation for their campus.
At least that narrows it down to two. One is in the heart of a not so safe city... scary thought. I am definitely leaning towards the last college which is an hour drive from where I live. The good news is that they are a bit less expensive than the others and they have a four year bachelors program to be a Pharmacist (i would list the names of the specific colleges but for safety purposes I prefer not to do so).

Since I have a 3.0 GPA I would get a scholarship of a few thousand dollars for that alone, and I can get another few thousand dollars bumped off if I score well on my ACT test on October 24 (please pray that I do well!).

But we are still talking around approximately $10-14,000 a year for college tuition!
More good news is that sometimes, pharmacy stores like CVS, Walgreens, and Rite Aid provide a special scholarship program where if you promise to work for them for so many years after you complete your college education, they will help you pay for your tuition!

As great as that is I still need lots of prayer that I will have discernment in choosing what to do for my college education. I am not even sure yet if it is God's will that I do become a Pharmacist.

I think not knowing God's plans is the hardest part of figuring out what to do because for me, I want God's will to be done in my life. I want to take a path that will glorify God's name, a path that will let His light shine in me!
Please pray that I will see what God's plan is for me. He may reveal the plan to me in a few weeks or maybe not until next year but as long as I find peace in my decision, I will know it is His will, not just mine.

Thanks for your prayers!
Blessings,
Butterfly