From Cold Lake to Calgary and back again

Alexandra Crevier lives in Cold Lake, Alberta, 600 kilometers north and east of Calgary.

She lives there with her two year old son, Hudson, and their dog Piper. Her parents live there too.

She likes it in Cold Lake, and wants to stay.  She’d also like to become a teacher.

Crevier earned her undergrad degree in 2011 in English Literature with a minor in French, and then moved up to Cold Lake, where, at the time, things were booming--there were lots of jobs and lots of money.

“I had the opportunity to teach at the French Language School on base (CFB Cold lake), but English Lit was what I really liked,” she says.

Crevier decided to go back to school to get her teaching degree. But that posed a problem for the 28-year-old, when she found out she was pregnant.

“My plans were put on hold and I knew things would have to take place differently as I was going to have a child but I was certain, even back then, that I wanted to be a teacher.”

“I’ve always been involved in tutoring and teaching adults, and it has really solidified the gratification I get from seeing others excel. I know I am the type of person that needs to follow a career path where I can make a difference in the world, and I truly believe that teachers make some of the biggest differences.”

So what to do?

Once her son was born, Crevier and her partner had plans to move to Calgary.  She applied to the Werklund School of Education’s two year after-degree B Ed program. 

But then the bottom dropped out of the energy market and Crevier’s partner decided not to move.

She telephoned the undergrad office to tell them that, sadly, she would have to decline the offer of admission to the campus-based program.  

She says it turned out to be one of the best calls she’s ever made.

During the conversation, she was told about the community-based two-year post degree program. “Up until this point, no other school offered an online post degree program.”

“I knew right then and there that this was the program I was going to be applying for and striving to enter.”

And so she did, and she hasn’t looked back.  She was on campus for two weeks of introduction last summer—to take some classes and meet her cohort—and she says the experience was life-changing.

“The time I spent on campus was really amazing. It brought me back into the student mindset and really set the pace for what the whole year was going to look like. It was also nice to be able to meet my fellow classmates and be able to put faces to names.”

“Honestly? I  don’t think there would have been another way for me to achieve my teaching degree as my family and my life is all in Cold Lake and I would not have been able to move on my own and attend school full time as well as support my little family.”