Urban Legends

Question: What do these things have in common?

If anyone has ever told you that there are literally thousands of dollars available in the form of scholarships and grants for college and graduate school, let me be the first to tell you, it is an outright lie. These things simply do not exist. Like the Loch Ness Monster, the Yeti, and El Chupacabra, they are simply mythical objects that exist in the form of urban legend and no where else.

I graduated 10th in my class in high school, member of the National Honor Society, secretary of Student Council, 4 year varsity letter in Track, 3 sport athlete, member of band, chorus, and Drama Club. My parents were poor, my mother was a school teacher who went back to school for her degree when I was 11, and my step dad was a tool maker. Their combined income was probably $50,000 and my mom’s student loans were a major source of debt for our family for years after she graduated.

Amount of scholarship dollars I received after applying for every available funding source I was qualified for:
$0.00

Oh sure, I got the Federal Subsidized and Unsubsidized Stafford Loans, but that was it for me in terms of financial aid. I graduated from Keene State College in 1998 with over $20,000 in student loans. I then went on to pursue a career in teaching, where I barely earned enough income to make even the minimum payment on those loans. To date I still owe around $15,000 to pay for my undergraduate degree.

When I decided to quit my job and go back to graduate school, I did so with the intent of applying for and receiving some form of graduate assistance – after all, nobody actually pays for Graduate School, right? (at least not in the sciences, at any rate). I rocked the GREs, applied to UNH, got accepted, and then proceeded to not get any form of scholarship or tuition assistance – with the exception of, you guessed it – Subsidized and Unsubsidized Stafford Loans.

What cracks me up about those loans is that after an elaborate application process that involves showing them proof of assets and income (or lack thereof) in the form of your tax returns, the federal government in some act of financial aid wizardry decides that based on your paltry income of $30,000, your family contribution (that would be you and you only) is expected to be approximately 2/3rds of your income. Right. Even better is that you receive a letter that explains your financial aid package, which they refer to as an “award.”

It’s not an award. An award is some sort of a gift or compensation for achievement. If I have to pay it back at a high interest rate, it is not an award. It’s a loan.

During my first year of school I went ahead, bit the bullet and borrowed another $18,000 to pay for school and health insurance. There was no way I was going to not pursue the grad school thing – I am fairly certain that had I made the decision to remain at my job I would have been unemployed within a year anyway, since they are apparently on a trend of firing all of the teachers. So I decided to just take the plunge and pursue my dream of graduate school – something that I had always planned on doing but had not actually been able to do because of – haha – finances.

I applied for the two available graduate assistantships in our department after my first year of school, but those went to other incoming studetns, so I was foiled again. I didn’t want to borrow another $18k for my second year of school, but I didn’t get any other form of financial aid, so I had to come up with a new plan. Rather than take the “award” of a high interest loan, I decided to withdraw all of the funds from my meager retirement account. This way, I could pay for school with cash. I know, that sounds like a bad idea. But remember, I was employed as a teacher in one of the lowest paying school districts in the state. I didn’t exactly have a ton of money in there anyway, and once you quit teaching and stop paying into the account, it stops earning interest and then it’s just basically a really large virtual shoebox full of cash under your bed.

So last summer I withdrew all of the money, paid a penalty on it, was taxed another 10% on top of that, and then signed it all over to UNH – because I need to finish this degree so I can hopefully some day get a meaningful job that actually pays me a living wage.

My advisor informed me of a scholarship for part time graduate students and told me that I should apply. It made sense, after all – I am a part time student for my last semester of graduate school. The application was spartan in the collection of pertinent information – name, address, student ID info and a concise statement discussing the unique challenges I face as a part time graduate student.

I had half a mind to tell them I thought scholarship apps were bullshit because after years of always telling them what I thought they wanted to hear, I had yet to have received a cent in the form of a scholarship or any form of financial aid other than a high interest federal loan. But the rational side of me said no, that’s a bad idea because then you are basically assuring that you won’t get it, you have to at least try. So, I wrote a brief, concise statement describing my decision to return to school after many years as a public school teacher (which should have clued them in that I was basically living at the poverty level) to pursue further education so that I could work in a hospital based/research setting in an attempt to help people make improvements to their health. I stated that I had to travel 110 miles round trip every day to come to campus, and that I had drained my entire retirement account to pay for my last year of school, and that this $1000 scholarship would really make a significant difference to my financial situation. My application also included copies of my transcripts, which include excellent GRE scores (I was in the 99th percentile for writing, who’d have guessed?), a high GPA as a graduate student and a Bachelors Degree with Honors.

About a week after I sent that application over my car battery shit the bed and it cost $1200 to repair it, so that scholarship would be really beneficial right now.

Today I got my nice little letter form the Wizards of Slytherin or whomever makes the decisions on financial aid. The letter looked like this:

Dear Kerry,

The Tuition Scholarship Selection Committee met on January 26th to review applications for part-time tuition scholarships. I am sorry to inform you that you were not selected to receive a scholarship.

The number of highly qualified applicants for the awards this Semester made our decision most difficult. I can assure you that the Tuition Scholarship Selection Committee made a conscientious effort to review all facets of each applicant’s record including the statement on the application in making the award.

Thank you for your application.

The take away message from this, kids, is that good grades and true financial need have no bearing whatsoever on how decisions are made regarding the award of academic scholarships. The entire process apparently involves chimpanzees and a dart board and not much else.