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A Perfect Match

Amber Cash will never forget the first day she walked into the Lynchburg Campus as a prospective student. The attention she and her mom received was so personal that National instantly "felt like a family," says Amber. It didn't take much more to convince her that National was going to be a match for her, and she enrolled in the computer applications technology degree program shortly thereafter.

She soon discovered that the personal attention didn't just stop at the door, but continued in every classroom. The supportive structure and real-world teaching was exactly what Amber needed as a recent high school student who had struggled to keep her grades up. "High school just wasn't my thing," Amber admits, but college was a different story. All of her instructors had experience, either currently working or having worked jobs in the fields they taught, and each one of them brought that to their classes.

With her instructors telling her, "This is the way it is in the real life," and "If you don't shape-up, then you aren't going to get a job," Amber said it made things much more realistic. "You grow up so much faster," she shares, having the real-world point of view from her instructors to put the importance of her education into perspective. It also meant a lot to her that her mother made sacrifices so that Amber could be debt-free when she graduated. For Amber, one of the most practical real-world lessons she learned while a student at National College was how important good credit is -- and she realizes now what a huge benefit having an education with little to no debt can be.

Amber passes on the lessons and advice that she learned as a student to other National College students she now comes in contact with as an administrative assistant to Campus Director Bill Baker in Lynchburg. When she sees students encounter obstacles, she can tell them, "Hey, I’ve been on the same side," and encourage them. For her, the biggest reward is graduation: "It just gives [me] goose bumps," she shares when she sees students who came in and thought they couldn’t succeed at National, graduate and say, "I did it! I can't believe I really did it!"

For her, the most important part of her job is ensuring that her students are aware of the same thing that captivated her as a student at National: "It's very important for them to understand that we (the staff) are there for them," shares Amber, from the moment they walk in the door to the moment they walk across the stage.