Oral History Program Jordan Barker Interviewed by Chelsee Boehm 15 May 2018 Oral History Program Weber State University Stewart Library Ogden, Utah Jordan Barker Interviewed by Chelsee Boehm 15 May 2018 Copyright © 2018 by Weber State University, Stewart Library iii Mission Statement The Oral History Program of the Stewart Library was created to preserve the institutional history of Weber State University and the Davis, Ogden and Weber County communities. By conducting carefully researched, recorded, and transcribed interviews, the Oral History Program creates archival oral histories intended for the widest possible use. Interviews are conducted with the goal of eliciting from each participant a full and accurate account of events. The interviews are transcribed, edited for accuracy and clarity, and reviewed by the interviewees (as available), who are encouraged to augment or correct their spoken words. The reviewed and corrected transcripts are indexed, printed, and bound with photographs and illustrative materials as available. The working files, original recording, and archival copies are housed in the University Archives. Project Description The First-Generation Oral History Project began in 2018 in collaboration with Weber State’s First- Generation Club. The commonly accepted definition of a first-generation student is one whose parents/guardians did not earn a Bachelor’s degree. This project was created to capture the experiences of active first-generation students and alumni in an attempt to better understand the challenges that first-gen students face. These interviews explore the difficulties of navigating college, including scholastic and financial hurdles, as well as highlighting current students’ future goals and alumni successes. ____________________________________ Oral history is a method of collecting historical information through recorded interviews between a narrator with firsthand knowledge of historically significant events and a well-informed interviewer, with the goal of preserving substantive additions to the historical record. Because it is primary material, oral history is not intended to present the final, verified, or complete narrative of events. It is a spoken account. It reflects personal opinion offered by the interviewee in response to questioning, and as such it is partisan, deeply involved, and irreplaceable. ____________________________________ Rights Management This work is the property of the Weber State University, Stewart Library Oral History Program. It may be used freely by individuals for research, teaching and personal use as long as this statement of availability is included in the text. It is recommended that this oral history be cited as follows: Barker, Jordan, an oral history by Chelsee Boehm, 15 May 2018, WSU Stewart Library Oral History Program, University Archives, Stewart Library, Weber State University, Ogden, UT. Jordan Barker 15 May 2018 1 Abstract: The following is an oral history interview with Jordan Barker, conducted on May 15, 2018, in the Stewart Library’s Archives Conference Room, by Chelsee Boehm. Jordan discusses his life and his experiences as a first-generation college student at Weber State University. Alexis Stokes, the video technician, is also present during this interview. CB: My name is Chelsee Boehm, today is May 15, 2018 and we are at the Stewart Library. Today we are interviewing Jordan Barker. Jordan is a first-generation college student. Just to clarify, a first-generation student is one whose parents or guardians have not received a four-year degree. So, to begin, Jordan, can you tell me where you were born? JB: Seattle, Washington. CB: Okay, so did you grow up in Seattle? JB: No, we spent probably like the first three or four years of my life there and then we moved down here. So we’d go back to visit every now and then. But the majority of the time I grew up in North Ogden. CB: So what brought you and your family to North Ogden? JB: It was family in general. CB: So what kind of work do your parents do? 2 JB: My dad is a real estate agent who owns his own company and then my mom has been fortunate enough to be able to stay at home. So it was great growing up with somebody always there. It’s easy. CB: Definitely. And do you have any siblings? JB: Yes, I have two brothers and one sister. CB: Okay, and where do you fall in there? JB: I’m the oldest. CB: Okay. So when did you realize that you wanted to go to college? JB: I don’t think there was ever an option not to go to college. So as early as they start talking about it in elementary school. So really early. CB: Who was encouraging you to do that? Was school that influence or your parents? JB: They were pretty open about it. They just kind of said, “You know, do whatever makes you happy.” But as I got older they said, “Look we don’t want you to stress out about finances, being in something like sales or real estate.” Real estate is essentially sales, right? You’re selling homes and so the market dictates how much money you can make and inventory and so on and so forth. So, I wanted a job that was a little more secure than something like that. Not to say that sales isn’t a good degree. but that was my take on it. CB: So did you go to Weber High school? JB: Yes. 3 CB: Do you feel like there was any sort of preparations there for going to college? Did they work to prepare you at all? JB: In terms of like Advance Placement (AP) classes, yeah, there was. It was all dependent upon how much workload you wanted to take on personally. But, there was no push to do so from the faculty or anything like that. CB: Why did you choose Weber State? Were you looking at other schools? Did you go to another school first? JB: Yeah, that’s a great question. I was actually going to go to the University of Oregon and ironically enough it was going to be in sales. I was like, “No I don’t want to listen to my mom and dad.” So, it was going to be in sales and then I kind of adjusted that to advertising and the University of Oregon has a great program, but I really dislike the town of Eugene. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Eugene. It wasn’t super nice, so I didn’t go there and I decided to kind of backtrack and look at other options. This place is close to home, it’s affordable, everybody knows how great of a deal it is, and the education is beneficial. CB: So did you actually end up in Eugene or just go and look at it? JB: I went on a campus tour and the campus is great. Ig you ever get the opportunity to go, it’s awesome, it’s a huge school, but the town sucks. CB: So you chose Weber because it was close to home and it was cheaper? 4 JB: Yeah, and it was close to family. Around that time my mom got diagnosed with Leukemia and so life’s dynamic—everything changes. It was an easy decision to stay. CB: When did you start going to Weber? JB: Oh man. Probably like 2011, I think. CB: Okay. Can you tell me about your journey to college? What was it like to apply, figuring out financial aid, registering for classes, that kind of thing. JB: It was like a shot in the dark basically. I think every student goes up against that to a certain extent. I feel like the university lately has done a far better job at directing students, but when I applied it seemed like—especially where I didn’t have any help – I was just… I was not even coming out of high school, I was already a year out and I felt like I had to do everything on my own. Everything was just step by step. You apply online, I kind of wandered around campus and found where I could get my student I.D. So everything was kind of a shot in the dark. CB: Okay, so thinking back to your first semester, what were some of the biggest challenges that you faced? And how did you overcome them? JB: Just feeling like you fit in. Not in terms of social status or anything like that, but education wise. A lot of the time you think, “Am I really qualified to be here?” And I went into a science field, so that feeling never really goes away. You kind of just learn to cope with it and based on your performance through exams or working 5 with groups or whatever that may be, it makes it easier to deal with it on a day-to-day basis. CB: Okay, so what did you study? Or what do you study? JB: I graduated in mechanical engineering technology. CB: Okay, and you just graduated this last semester, right? JB: Like two weeks ago, yeah. CB: I believe you said you are coming back again for another degree? JB: Yeah, potentially. Weber just got the traditional mechanical engineering degree. It sounds dumb to come back, like why would you come back if you just graduated? But there is a little bit of a difference in terms of professional growth, so I might come back or I might pursue a master’s degree. CB: When you attended Weber were you a full-time student? JB: No, no. When I started out, I worked full-time. I’ve always pretty much worked full-time when I’ve gone to school. So I started out taking one class a semester and then it went to two classes, then it went to three classes, and then you get the idea of like, “Oh my gosh, this is never ending. 120 credits will go on forever if you take one or two.” So, then it’s just finding the time and the willpower to go full-time or up to 15 and 18 credits. Whatever that may be. CB: What kind of work were you doing? JB: For a little awhile it was all over the place. Then I fell into what I was going into. I worked for Ogden City for a little while. It was weird, kind of different. That was 6 more like manual labor, working outside, roofing. It was rough to do that all day and then come for night classes and then I fell into a manufacturing setting in the aerospace industry. CB: So other than working full-time, what else did you do besides being a student? Do you have a family or children that you have to care for? JB: Yeah, I got married in 2015 and then had a child in ’16. So, it was near the end of my college career, but that’s not to say that it wasn’t difficult, or still isn’t difficult. It’s still hard, but other than that no, it was pretty much going to school full-time— working full-time, that’s all I focused on. CB: This is kind of an obvious question, but can you talk a little bit about how having a spouse and then having a child kind of changes the dynamic of being a student? JB: Oh yeah, it totally changes the dynamic. It changes everything, from what you want to go into, all the way down to when you’re doing homework. I mean, if you don’t have kids or if you know anybody that does have kids, that look of stress and exhaustion—that’s real. And so not only do you have to fight through working full-time, but then you have to fight through trying to be there as a parent and a partner all day, every day. Then you have to wake up and do it all over again for you know, x amount of years until you graduate. CB: How have you learned how to balance things? Is it just learning by doing? JB: Yeah, a little bit. Like I said, everything changes daily, so if something is due one day, everything is just communication between me and my wife. I just talk to her 7 and say, “Look I have to do this.” Luckily she’s been great with helping me out with specific things and vice-versa for her. You know, if she’s having a bad day, then school can wait. You know, it will always be there I feel like, so you have to put it on hold. No matter how bad you want it, there are other things that come first. CB: Has she been going to school as well? JB: Yes. CB: So were you involved in any extra-curricular groups or clubs or sports or anything like that that you did while you were attending school? JB: No, not really. CB: Okay, what advice would you give to a perspective first-generation student who is thinking about starting college? JB: That it’s not impossible. One of the big things that I think gets overlooked, especially at larger universities, not so much this one, but is that a good thing to have is work experience. I mean specifically in the industry that you are going, in if you can. Even if it’s something as simples as a clerk but you work at a firm that you want you work for later on. It’s great to have a foot in the door. But just attempt to get into the industry that you are eyeing to graduate from. CB: Okay, so what are your goals. What do you want to do in the future? Maybe work wise, personally, things like that. 8 JB: The personal question gets me every time. It’s like every job interview, they ask you like, “Where do you want to be in life?” I just want to be happy in life. Ultimately, I think that’s everybody’s response, but I’m very driven in terms of education. I would like to have a masters, but I want no part in a Ph.D. If I had multiple masters, I’d be happy. But basically on a daily basis I want to apply what I’ve learned in school and learn more. I don’t ever want to stay stagnate. So whether that’s taking concurrent enrollment classes or continuous learning classes from the university or just being enrolled continuously at the university, I would always like to keep something going. I want to stay relevant, especially in a science and technology industry. CB: Okay, so can you tell me something that you are especially proud of being a first generation student? JB: Just that I was able to do it with a family and working full-time. Now I can kind of be the example for not only my family but my siblings as well. And to be able to talk to other people and tell them it’s not impossible. I love sitting down with students and like laying out tracks, showing them this is the fastest route to get to where you want to be, but you don’t have to do exactly that because there’s options all over the table. So, not necessarily one thing that I’m really proud of throughout the whole thing but just doing in in general, I guess. CB: Is that something that you’ve had the opportunity to do? To sit down with a lot of other students and kind of help guide them? 9 JB: Yeah, working in this industry there’s a lot of people that take ask me for advice. Or maybe they listen to the advice of a professor on getting into some position in the industry before you graduate. Working in aerospace manufacturing there’s tons of kids that are currently going to school. I’m a huge advocate for if you need help, just ask. It’s not a big deal. CB: So can you explain what exactly do you do for work? Can you describe what you do on a day-to-day basis? JB: You’re going to get sick of me saying this, it changes daily. So, it’s really hard to say. I am a manufacturing engineer at Parker Hannifin. I work in the repair and overhaul center. Specifically speaking they make commercial hydraulic actuators. In layman’s terms we pull the hydraulic systems off of planes and then repair and overhaul. Planes like Boeing or Be Havilland or Embraer or Gulfstream, any of these planes that nobody can afford or it’s just a commercial airplane. It’s not like everybody says, “Oh well, manufacturing is just a line job. It’s an assembly line job.” This is not that. It is very dynamic and very frustrating. Well for example, we can get a hydraulic actuator that’s from 1970. They don’t make a specific configuration anymore and so there is no upgrade to the manifold. There is no upgrade to a piston, so you just have to make it work. You have to figure out how to make it safely work and then it has to be bought off through multiple entities— The FAA and so on and so forth. CB: Have you had any professors that you’re really fond of or any particular classes that you really liked on campus? 10 JB: Yeah, definitely. I really liked Dan Magda, he was my senior project advisor. He was great, from just having his classes to working with him on a daily basis. He was awesome. Anything you needed, he would come in early. In fact, we did a whole redesign like two days before my senior project was due and he stayed with us really late at night to get it done. I think he stayed ‘till ten at night one time helping us with machine components. He was great, a great guy to work with. The other guy is John Armstrong, he teaches calculus based physics and he’s from the physics department obviously. He was one of the professors that really instilled that I can do this. You know, he said all the time, “You can do anything you want, you just have to be willing to work for it.” And one of his mottos is, “You have to do two of three things in life to be successful. You can either be a genius, you can be nice, or you can be on time. As long as you do two of the three, then you are good to go.” I think for most people, being nice and being on-time that’s easy to do and so far, outside of school it’s been great. CB: Were there any classes outside of your area of study that you really liked or that maybe you didn’t like? And you don’t have to name names. JB: I’m not a huge fan of a lot of the English classes. I really liked public speaking classes. I took debate in high school and so hopefully I’m not a horrible public speaker. But, I took public speaking and I think that a lot of kids should take those communication classes. It seems like in the science building the communication classes get knocked a lot of the time like, “Why would I have to do this?” Well, this is a great example why you have to do it. You’re in an interview, that’s a great example of when you have to use those skills. I think 11 everybody should have to do those. So, small group communications that was a great class. I went into with a bad attitude, I came out of it like, “I should major in communications.” It was awesome.