The Time Joel Applied to BYU

January was a crazy month for Joel and I. We had been tossing around the idea for him to go back to school, and we thought why not try BYU in Utah?? I heard the application was not so fun, but we decided to check it out anyways. Joel was suuuper overwhelmed with all the qualifications, thus resulting in us not looking at it again.

On Sunday the 27th, I was talking with a friend in church whose husband went to BYU tenish years ago. I decided to ask her what she thought about BYU, and any tips she would have for us. After that talk, I was determined to have Joel applying for the next semester. The deadline was February 1st. We had 5 nights.

In my mind, this was the PERFECT time to apply to BYU. The Freshman class were all going on missions so this would be the prime time to have him apply. Also, what if he could teach at the MTC? He is a native Swede, and since he served his mission in Norway he could also teach Norwegian. Perfect, right??

But oh boy was it tough.  Joel was born in the states and is a US citizen, but doesn't have a SSN. We went back and forth from Joel applying as an international student, and realizing he had to take an English test to prove his English is good enough. Folks, he corrects my English. Annnnd if he did have to take that test, that would mean he wouldn't be able to go this coming fall because they only offer this specific test a couple times a month up in Stockholm- 6 hours away.
We then realized he could apply as an American citizen, but that created other problems. For instance, he would have to take the ACT, a standardized American test that everyone and their dog hates. It doesn't make sense for Joel, who is not really an American, to take. Plus we didn't have time for that anyways. THEN the answer finally came to us. He went to IHM Business school in Gothenburg. Since he had 24+ credits there he didn't have to take the ACT, and he could register as an American citizen. Heck. Yes.

Monday night consisted of Skyping Aslak (the guy who went to BYU) for about three hours filling out all these little details. Without him, there was no way we could have accomplished it all. By the time we figured out we could register Joel as a transfer student, we had lots of questions for admissions. It would cost us 10 Swedish kronor a minute to call. After ten minutes of being on hold, we had spent 100kr, or about 16 dollars. Joel's case is so unique because he was born in the states.. so we had to talk to someone who knew what they were doing.

After a few nights and calling my mom on skype while she talked with admissions, we only had two more items to conquer on the application. His English test (he still had to take it because he has lived in Sweden for so long) and his grades from IHM Business School.

Aslak gave us a list of numbers to call in admissions, to see if they would waive his English test.

Joel calls the person he thinks he could pronounce their name the best, so he wouldn't mess up haha! This guy was super nice! Joel tells him all the reasons why he should have this test waived, but to our disappointment he keept on saying he isn't the right guy to talk to. He said he would try and transfer us to a lady bellow him on the admissions board, but luckily she wasn't in. Because he THEN transferred us to the head of admissions. The top dawg. I have never seen Joel so nervous. After talking to this mechanic-like-voice, he told Joel to email him with all his reasons and why his test should be waived... and that he would get back to us. When Joel got off the phone with him he said, "The last time I was this nervous was when I proposed to you!!!"

We were incredibly stoked that we were able to talk to him. We hurried and emailed him right away! Here was our list of reasons:
-Joel is married to an American and we speak English at home
-Joel's favorite class in High School was English
-In college, Joel also took English and was the highest in his class.

I believe there was more, but these were our top reasons.

That was on a Thursday, and the last possible day we could do much. We felt SO GOOD about how it was working out so well! At this point it seemed like he was meant to go. Mentally I was SO ready to move home, and nothing was stopping me.

We waited. And waited. And waited. And waited to hear back from Mr. Kirk Strong, the head of admissions. Finally after a week of waiting, we checked his application and IT WAS WAIVED. We were oh so giddy with excitement, we could hardly contain ourselves!!!! "This is really happening!" We said.

Since Joel went to IHM, it is an international school and we weren't worried about them accepting his grades. We had IHM send over his grades and such, so that was the last thing on the application that wasn't complete!! This was the point where we finally started telling people, and word got out about us moving in July, right before my sisters wedding.

We even found someone in the military, living in Germany, and moving to Colorado at the end of July that would bring our bed with them and have it shipped for free!

Now we knew we did all we could... all 110% of our effort to get into BYU. We felt content with that, and knew it would work out as it should. With all these little miracles happening, I was 99% positive it was right.. and that it was going to work out.

Then Joel got an email concerning his grades. At IHM their grading scale goes a bit like this: pass with distinction, pass, or fail grade. Don't worry though, he didn't get a fail ;) At BYU they have A, A-, B+, B, B- etc... and they needed us to "decode" his grades. There was a lot of calling and emailing all last week, trying to figure it all out. This past Saturday we got the last email saying his grades wouldn't work, and to apply the next semester. We were so heartbroken, because we wanted to go asap. I was bummed and tried not to cry about it all morning. Just the fact that EVERYTHING worked out so well, that pointed us in the direction that we were going to move.

Later that day we met with Joel's parents, talking about a possible job for me to be his dad's secretary, and help him sell his new book he just wrote. I would help him make contacts, get a web page up, make phone calls etc... Since he is a lawyer, he needed someone to help him with this anyways! It was killing two birds with one stone basically! I get a job that gets me into the system, and he gets help!

After his parents left I actually felt much better. We were playing the waiting game for soooo loooong and didn't know what our future was going to be. Now we finally had a direction. I will have a job, and I know where we will be. Everything in our apartment was put on hold because we thought, "Eh. We are moving. Why spend time and money in something when we are going to move??"

Now we almost feel relief that we aren't rushing into moving. We are planning on saving up and maybe (hopefully) moving in a year, year and a half. Right now Joel doesn't have a job, and that would have been hard to move with so little money. We have both prayed about it, and feel good about staying for now. Which is extremely comforting! That doesn't mean it will be easy though.. Living away from my family has been hard. I miss the comfort and the familiarity of home... playing games and staying up most the night with my mom and sisters. Especially my dad's sarcastic and dry humor that always makes me giggle. SO glad that AJ is getting married though, and we are coming to visit no matter what :)