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Faculty member goes the distance for students
Who would give up Valentine’s Day with her husband to drive four students to a law school recruitment forum in Houston? Criminal Justice faculty member Gretchen Choe would – and did.
Choe took three pre-law students she advises and another student from the University of Texas at Arlington on a road trip to Houston Feb. 14. She went to the UNT Denton campus to pick up a school van Friday afternoon, and left her house Saturday before 6 a.m. to meet the students at UNT Dallas. They left Campus and drove to the J.W. Marriott hotel directly across from Houston’s famed Galleria.
Posing in front of the Marriott Hotel Feb. 14 are (l to r) UNT UNT Dallas Assistant Professor Gretchen Choe and three of her students, Krystle Evans, Carrie Clites and Charles Imbert.
“There were law schools from all over the country being represented. They also had forums for the students on how to get financial aid, what kinds of aid are available for law school, how to take the LSAT and other different issues that might come up in the application process,” Choe said.
Two other students that she’s advising decided to go by themselves. The group spent three-and-a-half hours visiting with law school admissions representatives and going to meetings. They left the hotel around 2:30 p.m. to drive back to Dallas.
“On the way back we stopped at the Texas Prison Museum which is right off the freeway in Huntsville and spent about an hour there. I personally liked the ‘prison-opoly’ game that an inmate created, but the highlight is probably ‘Old Sparky,’ the electric chair,” Choe said.
The group arrived back at the Campus at about 7 p.m. When she got home 30 minutes later, she had a surprise waiting for her.
“My brother came to town to surprise me because the 13th was my birthday. I was wiped out, but we still had to return the van that night, so he and my husband and I drove to Denton, dropped off the van and ate at a Mexican food place we used to like up there.”
Student Krystle Evans said she was very grateful but felt horrible taking her professor away from her husband on Valentine’s Day. But she said the effort was in character for Choe.
UNT UNT Dallas student Krystle Evans looks at materials from one of the law schools represented at the law school recruitment forum in Houston Feb. 14.
“It was because of her I changed my major to criminal justice from social work,” Evans said. “She’s absolutely put herself forward for all of her students that are interested in law school. I couldn’t be any happier because I needed a guide, and she helped me put things in perspective. I couldn’t have asked for a better professor.”
Evans said attending the forum was very helpful. “I was extremely nervous because I didn’t know what to expect. I was always against going to law school because of the horror stories I heard, but going to the convention really helped me put things in perspective.”
Asked why she would go to the trouble she went to and drive eight hours on a Saturday, let alone Valentine’s Day, Choe said, “That’s when the forum was available for them to go. There was only going to be one in Texas for the entire year, and that was it. I wanted to make sure that they had the opportunity.”
“When I was a student, if somebody said there’s this great opportunity, but it’s in Houston, I probably would have said, ‘Yeah, it’s not that great.’ But if I knew that I would have transportation to get there, I probably would have taken them up on it.”
She calls her pupils “a really motivated group of students.”
“I’m really glad to be advising on campus. It’s really a privilege.”
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