3 more days!...

...Until I sign up for class!!! I'm a little nervous but curious and excited at the same time. Maybe a little scared too..but I heard it's always good to be a little scared? I better have the energy to go back into classes mode. Right now I'm still trying to catch up on sleep because this past weekend I was in Vegas for a friend's bachelorette party... out of the entire Vegas weekend, I think I only got 8 hours of sleep. Yea that's bad. So far I've been waking up super tired in the mornings for work... I just need to go to sleep earlier or something. I haven't even been to the gym yet this week. I still need to burn off all the Vegas calories.. but we didn't eat at the buffet and did a lot of dancing so hopefully it shouldn't be too bad. But then again.. today at work I'm being a fatty :/ I need to get to the gym ASAP when I don't feel too tired to go. Or should I go when I'm tired? I'm so lazy :(But anyways, I'm going to keep all the paper and information I printed out about CS because it should apply for UCR.. like the syllabus and everything and make a nice notebook/folder thing for myself.

I'm excited. Although should I study on the weekends? I hope my boyfriend won't be too bored. He fractured his hand so we won't be able to really do anything fun until it's healed... we were planning to go to 6 flags this Saturday..but I'm positive it's a no go now. Next time.

HealthCare Partners e-mailed me back...

... and I didn't get the job :( Maybe if I already had the CPC or CCA certificate, I would've had a better chance because on the application, it lets you list any certificates you have. When I saw that section, it was the first thing I thought of. Oh well. It wasn't meant to be yet. I think I'm pretty dead set I'm gonna go with UCR's program. It's the exact same as CS... and it's a little bit cheaper. I'm gonna officially enroll on Friday July 26. I want to enroll in July before the tuition discount deadline, but of course towards the end so I can have a little bit of freedom before I go back to taking classes after about a 3 year hiatus. I always did kinda wanna go back to school but I just don't see myself taking standardized tests and applying for grad school...and having to wait..and being all anxious. I guess taking classes at the extension center and getting certified in something is the next best thing. Maybe one day in the future I will try to get my Masters.. we'll see. Anyway, we'll see how this medical billing and coding program works.Wish me luck out there!

HealthCare Partners

So I haven't posted here in a few days. I actually haven't thought of any medical billing and coding schools in that time. I guess I wanted a break from it... plus there was some drama at the house so I wasn't really focused..but I am now. Last Friday, my boyfriend's mom told me to apply for a front desk position at her work. It wouldn't be full-time, it would be considered "per diem" which I guess is like part-time? My boyfriend told me it would be M-F and 4 hours a day. I'm not really sure how I feel about that yet. I'm just guessing I would probably be paid less so that's what I'm worried about. I hope I can keep paying rent and not have it be a problem... but yeah. My boyfriend said that job would be good because then for the rest of time, I can use to study for my class once I officially enroll. But yeah..about my decision, I think I'm leaning more towards UCR now... because it's a little bit cheaper. I think afterall I'm going to take the tuition discount instead of the laptop. I don't need a laptop at this time in my life. I have a macbook.

Plus it would be great to get 325 dollars off. I guess if UCR has the same curriculum as CS, and a better discount deal, then I might as well do that. Plus my dad thinks it would look better on my resume because the school is accredited and CS is not... I want to think that CS is well known too in the medical career world but I do not know that for a fact. I wish I could just ask someone. I want to ask my boyfriend's cousin some questions because he is a RN but my boyfriend doesn't think he'll know anything about it. Well... it wouldn't hurt to ask, right? Oh well. I don't even know I'll next see him. But yeah.. I hope I hear from HealthCare Partners soon.. I think I could really get my foot in the door with that job, even though I would only be working 4 hours a day. Hopefully I can advance up, especially if I take the medical billing and coding course. My boyfriend isn't sure, but he thinks his mom does medical billing too? I don't know. I guess maybe I'll find out in the future. I hope it also works to my advantage that I used my boyfriend's mom as a referral.

I mentioned her name in my application, as well as the quick cover letter I had to write on Friday lol. I hate writing cover letters. I think in the future I'm going to re-write it. I keep looking at examples because my writing has gone rusty... I feel that I wrote a little bit more sophisticated back when I was in high school which is sad, right? :/ Maybe I should read more books.

Until next time.

UCR pays Career Step to use their curriculum!

That's what I found out today. So pretty much, whatever school I decide to go with...between CS and UCR, I will be learning the same thing. That's pretty good to know. Now since I know this, I kinda want to go with UCR because it's a LITTLE bit cheaper... but at the same time I want to go to CS because they seem to be #1. I like CS because their advisers are nice and reply back to you within a timely manner... and they know what they're talking about. UCR on the other hand... even though I completed my undergrad there, they seemed to not know what I was talking about and had to look up stuff on the internet. I don't know how reliable they would be if I had any questions about the course. I know that for CS, in their demo site, you can e-mail pages to support to ask them questions. I'm wondering if I can do the same if I go with UCR? Like if I e-mail pages to the support, who will answer them? Will it be CS or will it be someone from UCR? That's one of my concerns. And also, will UCR offer the ICD-10 FastTrack Course after graduation or is that just what CS offers?

Even though UCR's curriculum is the same as CS, I still think I want to go to CS... I wonder why the prices for the two schools are different though. I thought they should be the same. If they were the same price, I think I'd have an easier time making a decision... I think after all of this, I still want to go to CS. They have always intrigued me ever since I started to research them a lot.

So I think I narrowed it down...

... to 2 schools. I still need to hear back from 3 schools (the traditional class ones) but I'm pretty sure I want to take an online course now. It doesn't seem so bad. Just as long as it will help me pass the national exams right? I will just have to study my ass off all day, everyday and just keep dedicating myself to it. I will slave away if I have to and study at my parent's house since it's more of a comfortable environment for me anyway... yeah... but here's another thing I found out: CS and UCR's demo site is the same! UCR's demo is owned my Career Step, so are their curriculums the same? If it's exactly the same, I might just with UCR since it's a little cheaper and they offer the same deals. And their tuition discount is 25 dollars better. I forgot if I already mentioned this but yeah... when I look at UCR's demo site, it says Career Step in the URL! I e-mailed Nicolette from CS and asked so I hope I get a response from her tomorrow or something. But yeah... I'm really curious now.

I'm actually a little excited about taking classes again... even if it is online. I think it will be better for me. I remember being an undergrad student and I would get bored in class. I'd have my laptop with me but I'd rarely pay attention. I mostly had to teach everything myself again later on when I would be studying for finals and I know that's bad. But it was good having a laptop in class to take notes. But once I finished copying down the slides, I would stop paying attention. I know that's bad now and I wish I did better in school. Hopefully I will get a second chance with this program and redeem myself. I really want to graduate with high marks and honors if they have that. If I could get in the medical field by next year, I will be so proud of myself and I bet my parents would be too. I just want to make them proud of me. And also if my dad will be paying for my education, it will just motivate me to do even better now. I don't want to waste my dad's money or my time.

Yeah... I need to tell myself this a lot more and read more inspirational quotes or something.

Career Step Demos

So I'm doing a preview of the demo for Career Step and I think to myself.. "this looks oddly familiar". A few days ago I looked at the demo for UCR's extension center and now I find out it's the same thing?? If that's the case, I'm wondering if the curriculum is the same? Like the layout of the program is the exact same. When I log into the demo using UCR's username and password, it still says Career Step in the top left corner.. so are they affiliated or something? I think I might e-mail Nicolette and ask her because I really want to know. If that really is the case, then I may just take the course with UCR because it's a little bit cheaper and the tuition discount is better by 25 dollars if I decide to get the tuition discount instead of the free laptop lol. Hmm.. well this is interesting...

American College of Medical Coders (ACOMC)

I forgot to mention that I found another online school. I found it on yahoo answers somehow. I doubt I'm gonna go here but I just wanted to mention what I found. It offers an online course and also a traditional course. The online course is cheaper than the traditional course. I wonder what the difference is... do both teach the exact same things? I wouldn't want to take the traditional course for this class though. On their website it mentions that they meet once a week for 6 hours!! Even though it's 6 hours its almost a full work day!! Yeah I think I'd be brain-dead. Online classes are just starting to seem more and more appealing... the online class costs 1499 (cheaper than Career Step) and 2499 for the traditional class..which is still cheaper than Career Step. I don't really know why I'm mentioning this school. For some reason it just seems hard to find schools that teach this course traditionally. I guess if I were to find a good prestigious school that offered outpatient and inpatient medical billing and coding with everything I'm looking for, I would probably consider it as well.

I thought it would be UCR but the people on the other line just sounds iffy.. the program manager Jennifer Campbell keeps spamming my inbox with automated e-mails about information about the course that I have already read on the website! I wish she would stop. Hopefully there is a unsubscribe button or something. I think she only really replied to like 1 of my e-mails that wasn't automated lol. But yeah.. kind of sucks that I have to judge a course by the program "manager" lol, no offense but she doesn't sound like she knows what she's talking about in the e-mails if all she's doing is basically copying and pasting the website in e-mail format...