My educational goals have become my personal goals in the past few months. I decided a little while ago that I was going to pursue a criminal justice degree due to some few bad incidents in my life. I have decided to turn my anger and hatred from being sexually assaulted into a personal goal to help at least one special victim during my career. A personal goal I have is to graduate from college with a Criminal Justice degree. I want to graduate from college with this degree to be able to go further in my future career. With this degree I can do more specialized jobs as a cop or detective than someone who did not attain this degree. I want to join the Police Academy and become a Special Victims Detective to help victims that have been sexually assaulted. When I was a little girl my cousin raped me. I never reported it to the police because I was so terrified. A few years later I was raped again by my best friends brother. I thought for the longest time there was something wrong with me. I felt like it was my fault. After years of trying to forget about the rapes, I was finally putting my life back together. I wanted to move on and forget everything happened.
At the age of sixteen, my step dad tried to molest me. I contacted the police and told them what happened. They really did not do anything like they should have, so I decided to contact Child Protective Services, (CPS). The woman who took my case found it fit to remove me from the home and place me in my dads custody. I thought the nightmares were over and I could move on with my life. On July 15, 2012 my ex-boyfriend raped me. I went to the police and filed a report against him. Detective Alonzo, the case officer, took my report and talked to me a few times. He sent my case to the District Attorney’s office and told me that it would be taken care of. I waited for almost a month and I had not heard anything from him, so I went to the police station and asked about my report. He explained to me that the District Attorney’s office denied my case because I was seventeen years old and there was no physical force, therefore, they would not press charges on the guy who raped me. After hearing that they would not do anything to help me, I decided that I was going to pursue a degree in the Criminal Justice Department.
I want to earn the degree, become a Special Victims Detective, and have the satisfaction of knowing that I helped at least one victim who had gone through what I did. My career goals, however, reflect my personal goals. I want to attain the Criminal Justice degree and become a criminal investigator. After I complete this degree, I want to become an attorney for the Special Victims to help give the victims the justice they deserve. My career interests and competencies should help guide my personal academic journey by giving me the confidence and heart I need to accomplish the goal. The degree I need for my future career, however, does help me build on my competencies. The academic work I do in my course assignments do relate to my competencies, such as organizing and strategizing. I may use my personal ethics and My Career Plan competencies and reasoning aptitude results to guide my academic journey as I work through my program by keeping my core values and skills.
