Student/Alumni Profiles
Jason Fagan
Living His Own Life
Jason Fagan knew he wanted to move from the small town he grew up in—La Junta—after high school but didn’t know where he was going to move or why. “I wanted to experience more, to live on my own, to have a better range of jobs to pick from, and to go to a good school.”
Recently done with his third term at Colorado Technical University in Colorado Springs, Jason couldn’t be happier. “I love living on my own. My classes are challenging. I’m managing to work part time. I’ll have my Associate’s degree by next spring. I couldn’t ask for much more. Coming to Colorado Springs and CTU was the perfect move.”
During his senior year at La Junta High School, Jason knew he wanted to go to college but didn’t exactly know where. A campus visit from a CTU recruiter made up his mind. “I loved the whole presentation the CTU guy did. He did a great job of showing me what the school was about, what kinds of programs were there, and the types of professors I would have. I applied to a community college, too, just in case, but it was really CTU that I wanted to go to…and here I am.”
Jason is majoring in Criminal Justice. Several family members are already in law enforcement as police officers, but Jason says he wants to be different. “I want to be an investigator.” Jason is the first member of his family to move away and earn a college degree. “My family is proud of me. They joke that I’ll be paying off their bills pretty soon!”
Jason isn’t just going to college, either; he’s excelling at CTU. So far his GPA is a 3.9. “In high school I was a good student—my average was around a 3.5—but this feels so much different. There is lots of homework but it is all relevant and not the kind of busy work teachers gave you in high school. Here the professors aren’t trying to waste my time.”
While Jason is most interested in the Criminal Justice classes, he has found other classes to be surprisingly valuable as well. “Whatever the class, the size is always small. I don’t think I’ve had a single class with more than 30 students. This small size is beneficial; I get to interact more with the teachers and the class. I’ve had two semesters where everyone is required to speak at least once in each class. Everyone gets involved, and I think that is pretty cool. In high school, I hated speaking in class and here I’ve had to do a few speeches as well as all this classroom participation. I’m getting a lot more comfortable and see how public speaking can be a good skill to have.”
“I feel like I’m learning and being challenged. I took this Ethics class and I didn’t have any background in ethics at all. It was an amazing class and got me thinking about things I had never thought about before. Criminal Law was another class like that. The professor had us thinking so much and had us doing hypothetical scenarios. It was pretty cool.”
“I was excited about Criminal Justice before I even started classes, but now I’m even more excited to get out and get working in the field. Thankfully, at CTU, I don’t need to wait years to get my degree. I can be well into my career by the time I would have gotten a degree from another school.”
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