Some people don't appreciate the fine art of Scrapbooking.

Today, I had my final class meeting with Dr. Misenhelter and the other interns. We filled out our surveys, talked about job postings, and turned in our portfolios. Ahh, the portfolio. The piece of the puzzle that has haunted my dreams over the last few weeks. I slaved over this giant piece of literature for almost a week, compiling personal thoughts and reflections and proof of my participation in the school system. On Monday night, I even added the perfect touches that make it so poignantly "G," creating a photo montage of the last five months. I didn't go to bed last night until almost 3:00 AM. Well, you can imagine what this thing looks like, especially when you know that I went through two black ink cartridges on my printer for this thing.

Anyway, I get to the meeting and Dr. Misenhelter asks for our portfolios. I pull mine out and anxiously wait for him to see it. I glance around and notice that some of these people are not into the "make it pretty" style of presentation that I like. Dr. Misenhelter takes all of our portfolios, some in binders as thick as mine and some in just a small presentation folder, and sets them on the piano. We then start to fill out our surveys (FOUR different surveys that all ask the EXACT same question, mind you) while Dr. Misenhelter begins to review our portfolios.

Now by review I mean he thumbs through each folder to make sure there is a section for all required elements of the portfolio. Does he read anything in the portfolio? No. Does he take the time to appreciate all the detailed work that I had put into this culmination of the last five months? Not really. Across the top of my evaluation page, there is a note jotted about it being an excellent model. When he hands them back to all TEN of us fifteen minutes later, he says that some of these were really good and makes the comment that he wishes he could keep a few of these for examples and raises his eyebrows in my direction. I guess that is my validation for all the work I put into this stupid thing.

Oh well, now I'm on to Kinko's to get it copied and bound. Maybe someone will hire me based on this portfolio...