The System: College Admissions and Scholarships

I am exhausted with the college application process, and I am not even the one applying to college.  The whole system is a game, and I, for one, am just plain disgusted with everything about it.

For Kyle, choosing a college wasn't such a big ordeal.  He was a good student with a decent GPA and an above average ACT score.  He had a solid resume with activities and service.  He could have gotten in pretty much any of the schools he applied to, but his scholarship opportunities were minimal.  He didn't really know what he wanted to do, but he knew he wanted to graduate with as little debt as possible, so he decided early on that he'd attend an in-state, public university in order to use his KEES money and get in-state tuition.  Luckily for him, he scored a coveted full-ride scholarship at UofL because of all of his civic involvement during high school.  Had he not gotten that scholarship, he would have probably ended up at UofL or Northern Kentucky University or Western Kentucky University, and it would have been fine.  The merit scholarships he received were enough to offset the majority of the tuition, and he would have had to take out only a few thousand dollars of loans.

Claire, on the other hand, is in a quandary.  She is my most academically gifted child with an unweighted GPA of 4.0 and weighted well into the mid 4.5 range.  She's taken the hardest classes at school.  She's involved in several clubs.  She's danced since she was four years old.  She works at a nursing home.  She is a Kentucky Governor's Scholar.  But her ACT score is at the bottom end of "full ride."  

Claire is a perfectionist, very methodical, and takes her time in order to ensure accuracy.  Therefore, even though she gets 100% of the questions correct when taking the ACT at home un-timed, she fails to complete some of the sections during the actual test and has to guess at the last few, missing enough to keep her from attaining that magic number that equals "Major Scholarship" even though she scores high enough to get accepted to pretty much any school she wants to attend.

So we are left with this:  she can get in; she can get good scholarships, but we can't pay for the rest of the tuition without taking out tens of thousands of dollars in loans.

And this is where the bullshit starts.

Thankfully, we are able to afford ACT classes and a private tutor for her.  After her first ACT test, we paid for her to attend a week-long class right before the next ACT, and she was able to bring her score up about 4 points.  The next couple of times she took the ACT, she would go up in one area and down in another, getting basically the same composite score, which, while high by most any standard, wasn't high enough.  

So we paid for a private tutor.  She went twice a week for several weeks to work on speed and short cuts and tricks of the trade.  We are waiting to see if her latest score improves, and I hope it does, because we've spent nearly a thousand dollars over a couple of summers trying to help her reach that magic number.

But here's the thing...what about kids from families who don't have the money to pay for a private tutor?  What about kids who don't have the guidance from home?  It's not fair to kids who may be just as smart or smarter than Claire not to have the same advantages she had.

And then there is the Common Application.  This fabrication of a college application is so much crap that I don't even know where to begin.  Okay, let's start with the essay prompts.  

1. Some students have a background, identity, interest, or talent that is so meaningful they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

 2. The lessons we take from failure can be fundamental to later success. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience?

3. Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea. What prompted you to act? Would you make the same decision again?

4. Describe a problem you've solved or a problem you'd like to solve. It can be an intellectual challenge, a research query, an ethical dilemma - anything that is of personal importance, no matter the scale. Explain its significance to you and what steps you took or could be taken to identify a solution.

5. Discuss an accomplishment or event, formal or informal, that marked your transition from childhood to adulthood within your culture, community, or family.

But you can't write about the death of someone you love, and you can't write about a sports failure, and you must make it "unique" and grab the reader at the first sentence. Claire has been working on hers for weeks, but she just can't find the right tone or idea.  She knows the admissions people are looking for that certain "uniqueness" in the essay, and she is stuck.

Again, some kids are able to hire writing coaches who help them come up with a topic, do a rough draft, write, edit, and then turn it in.  We haven't done that yet, but I know people who have.  Good for them if they have the money.  We could, I guess, but I just don't want to.  It shouldn't be necessary.  

There are people who are able to hire college counselors who do nothing but help their kids submit applications, prep for the ACT, do mock interviews, etc., all in the hopes of getting the full-ride.  And that's great...for those kids.  But the majority of people in the good ol' USA don't have that luxury, so what we are creating is a privileged class of college students who get the scholarships and the full-rides over kids from families who can't afford all of the one-on-one.  I admit, we are a part of that first group.  It's hard not to do it if you can, and it will benefit your child.

Meanwhile, we have all of these colleges and universities coming to the high schools, touting their institutions of higher learning, getting the kids all psyched up to go on a campus visit.  And we go, and we love it, and then we see the sticker price, and leave with our mouths hanging open in shock.  

Claire would like to maybe go to the University of Pittsburgh or St. Louis University.  We visited both last week, and the campuses are amazing.  The dorms at SLU are all new.  The workout facility is fantastic.  The opportunities for study abroad are top notch.  They even have a satellite campus in Madrid.  But the tuition alone is $40,000 a year plus fees.  Room and board another $12,000-13,000 a year.  If Claire gets the maximum amount of merit scholarship possible, she would get $76,000 over four years.  Nothing to sneeze at, for sure, but minus $76,000 from $210,000, and you are left trying to figure out how to come up with another $132,000.  

Sure there are grants and loans.  We filled out the FAFSA with Kyle, and we make too much to get any grants and not enough to afford the tuition without taking out the loans.  A student from SLU called our house after our visit asking if we had any questions.  I laughed and asked how do people afford SLU?  He replied that many of his friends get 50% tuition through scholarships.  Okay, great.  But that still leaves that tiny issue of where to come up with the other 100K.  

The University of Pittsburgh, Centre College, Hanover College, the University of Dayton...all of them were the same.  $40,000-55,000 a year.  Probably half tuition in merit scholarships.  We have to come up with the rest.  All of them offer full-rides, but maybe 10-20 max out of thousands of applications.  She could very well get one, and she might, but if she doesn't, then what?

So we are looking at in-state, public universities as a back-up plan.  I've told Claire she can apply for any school she wants.  She will also apply for any full-tuition scholarship she is eligible for at these schools (again with the "tell about a time you failed" essays).  But unless she gets a full-ride to one of the other universities, she will be going to UK or UofL or WKU.  Kirk and I feel very strongly that we don't want our kids to graduate with a mortgage payment unless they have a house to go with it.

Silent No More: Thoughts on the sexual harassment in my life

After the videotape of Donald Trump and Billy Bush surfaced yesterday, Kelly Oxford, a writer in LA, started a tweet storm with the hashtag #NotOkay.  She asked women to share their stories of sexual harassment, writing about their earliest memory of inappropriate behavior against them.  I started thinking about the times I was harassed over the years.  I remember my first experience, since it is seared into my brain because of the shame I felt at the time, but then an avalanche of unwanted and unwelcome sexual advances and comments started flowing through my mind.  I thought I would write them down.

My earliest memory of harassment happened at the end of sixth or seventh grade.  One of our classmates was having a pool party after the last day of school.  My mom sent me to school that day with my new bathing suit (a cute, rainbow two-piece that I loved) and my Garfield beach towel.  We walked over to her house en masse, joking and laughing on the way.  Her pool was above ground with a small deck around it, set back from her house and the patio where the moms sat to chaperone.

We changed and jumped into the water.  It was cold, but we were so excited to be swimming for the first time that summer, that we didn't mind.  We had chicken fights, kids were dunking each other, and  doing cannonballs off the deck.  Some got out to get food; others, like me, stayed in.

I was hanging with a friend when a group of boys came up and surrounded me and started splashing me in the face.  As I tried to splash back, I heard one of them yell, "Grab her!" and two boys grabbed my arms and two grabbed my legs and held me back against the side of the pool.

My immediate fear was that I was going to drown.  Water was splashing over my head and I was gasping for air.  All of a sudden, one of the boys went underwater and grabbed my bathing suit bottoms and pulled them down.  He came up shouting, "I can see her hairy bush!"

The boys holding my arms and legs let go, and all went under the water to get a glimpse of my pubic hair before I had a chance to get my suit bottoms up.  I pulled them up as quickly as I could and got out of the pool and ran to the patio, where the moms, oblivious to what was going on, sat drinking Tab and talking.

I wrapped myself in my beach towel and sat in the sun, ashamed and humiliated.  I felt vulnerable and angry, and I never told a soul.

That was just the beginning.

During the last couple of years at my Catholic grade school, I continually had my uniform skirt pulled up so the boys could get a glance at my underwear.  Once it was on a tour of the museum at the Cathedral of the Assumption downtown where we were learning about our faith before our Confirmation.  Once I was having my period, and blood had leaked onto my underwear.  I told my teacher, and instead of admonishing the boys to keep their hands to themselves, she said maybe I should start wearing shorts under my skirt.  I finally did, but I should not have had to do that.

I was an early bloomer.  I hated my breasts.  I had one shirt that I wore nearly every day that smashed me down enough that I remained flat-chested as long as possible, but it wasn't long at all.  I was very well-endowed for my age.  Boys in my class would hold me down and feel me up or "accidentally" bump into my breasts.  I had boys give me "titty twisters."  I was called "Jugs" and "Tits."  I began to slouch to cover up my figure.  My mom used to get after me all the time to stand up straight and put my shoulders back, but I was afraid if I did that, it would only bring on more "titty twisters," more groping, more condescending language.  I felt humiliated and ashamed of my body.  Still, I never said a word.

Most of high school was spent in an all-girl environment, and I had steady boyfriends for much of the time, so it wasn't too bad.  I did have a date with a guy my senior year who just randomly pulled into a bank parking lot on our first date and started trying to feel me up.  We only went out once.  Another guy got angry with me because I told him to stop trying to touch my breasts.  He said, "Well then why did you agree to go out with me?"

I worked as a cashier at a family grocery store.  Our assistant manager was good friends with the owner and harassed me constantly.  "What size bra do you wear?" "Sharron, bend over and let me see you pick up that pencil" that he had dropped on purpose.  He would come up next to me while I was ringing someone up and stand as close as he could and brush his body against mine. He was about 6'2" and had played football.  I am 5'4".  Imagine how powerless I felt.  As an assistant manager, he was in charge of closing the store, and often I was one of two female cashiers working to close of the day.   He and the other male workers would make crude comments after the doors were locked.  The other female workers and I could do nothing.  Who could we tell?  He was friends with the owner.  We knew if we said anything, the harassment would only get worse.  I finally quit and went to work somewhere else, but I shouldn't have had to do that.  I never told anyone why I left.

I was at my general practitioner's for my annual pelvic exam when I was about 21.  My doctor did the vaginal exam with a nurse present but then came back in before I had a chance to get dressed.  He started flirting with me and asked me out to dinner five minutes after having his fingers inside me doing a Pap smear.  I sat on the exam table in a paper gown, the stirrups still out, no idea what to do.  I told him I had a boyfriend.  I felt gross and violated and still, I never said anything.  Who would I tell?  I didn't know.

I had a favorite high school teacher, who I respected and admired, ask if he could kiss me.

I had a youth minister tell me that if he was 20 years younger, he'd ask me out.

I had a priest tell me that if he'd met me 30 years earlier, he wouldn't be a priest.

I had an army officer tell me that pregnancy looked good on me because it sure made my boobs big.

I've been called a "MILF" by students where I was substitute teaching.

There are more, but you get the picture.

I'm not commenting on Trump.  I am saying that I have been harassed throughout my life, starting when I was 12 years old.  I know I am not alone as evidenced by #NotOkay.  This happens every single day to women all over the world.  I know my experiences are not as bad as some women have had, but they were bad enough over the years to bring me shame and humiliation and to make me embarrassed about my body.  It has taken me a long time to feel good about how I look.

I don't want my daughters or my nieces to ever experience what I did.  I have spoken with my girls about what I went through and told them to speak up.  To say stop.  To tell someone if anything like this ever happens to them.  I have told my son that he is never, ever to do or say anything to demean women, and that if he ever sees it happening, he is to speak up, to stand up against it.

So for all of those years that I remained silent, I will stay silent no more.  It was wrong in 1979.  It was wrong in 1987.  It was wrong in 2005.  It is wrong now, and it needs to stop.