Doctoral Testimonial

Dr. Earl F. Cater, Ed.D

My doctoral degree is so new that if you brush close to me you can see the fairy dust on my shoulders sparkle. But wait! Fairy dust speaks of outside intervention from a fairy godmother and I hammered my dissertation out of red-hot steel with excruciating sweat and labor.
I did receive help in the form of coaching, collaboration, encouragement, and instruction from the School of Advanced Studies deans, instructors, staff, and committee members. However, they did not labor over learning academic writing, American Psychological Association formatting, critical thinking, and research analysis. I did these things. I hammered out the red hot steel of my dissertation and when I, or someone else, found something wrong, I hammered some more. It was excruciating labor accomplished with fiery passion over a four-year span of time.
Right now you are asking: Do I have the chutzpa to complete a doctoral degree? But the real question is: Why do you want to do this? And, is your reason for doing this powerful enough to carry you through to completion? If you are willing to grow, and change, and sacrifice to accomplish a marvelous transformation of the way you think and work, you do have the chutzpa to be a doctoral student.
Look, this is ugly: While completing my doctoral degree I lost my oldest sister, my mother, my brother, and my younger sister. I alone am left out of my paternal family. Darker still is the fact that I underwent open heart surgery the night before starting a class in curriculum design.
During the same four years, two children got married and my children doubled the number of my grandchildren to 16. You might think I am crazy, but I never took a break because of these life altering events. I just continued to hammer on that red-hot steel with excruciating sweat and labor.
Why? Because I believe in what I am doing and received from University of Phoenix the encouragement, instruction, and support needed to get this job done. Maybe I am cut from different cloth than most. I doubt it. There must be some hard working fiery heat somewhere down inside of you or you would not be looking at a doctoral degree.
I am not a young person. I started work at age four attending the pumps in my dad's gas station. At 15, I started working as a commercial artist. I paid my way through college, served six years in the United States Army, attended seminary and worked as a pastor for 35 years. Now I want to teach until they roll me out the door in a wheelbarrow.
I wrote a dissertation on oral storytelling and received a Doctor of Education with an concentration in Curriculum and Instruction from University of Phoenix.
What do you want to do with the rest of your life?