The epitome of getting your dreams crushed.

[december_solstice]

Well sort of.

Can you believe there was a time when you could actually WORK your way through college? Now, students are spending the cost of a house in less than 4 years.

College is an investment. One that isn't easy to make if you're poor.

The worst is that overwhelming excitement you feel after finding out you got in -- then realizing you can't even afford the tuition deposit, or any other fee thrown at you that is required to even register for your classes.

My spirit? Crushed. My dreams? In ruins.

Yeah, I'll get over it, sure, eventually I will move along and carve a new path for myself.

But there is something else I've realized. It's all nonsensical. Higher education is a profitable business -- it does NOT have the student's best interest in mind.

Here is my story:

I recently completed my Bachelor's and graduated with a 3.5 GPA. This Spring, I applied for an MFA program, with the same university, and got in! This summer, I took my final 2 credits I needed to graduate and start my MFA program in the Fall.

By the time I was nearly done with my short 7 week summer course, I discovered that I would not qualify for any financial aid. For me to qualify, I would need to take 6 credits or more. Why would I take 6 credits, when I only need 2 to graduate? Why would I waste upwards 10,000 in federal grants, scholarships and student loans, that I simply do not need to spend? Why on earth would I do that? That funding could be applied to another deserving student.

This problem has only presented itself because I wanted to graduate this summer, instead of in the Fall. It was the most logical solution to complete my final credit in the summer, therefore being able to attend graduate school in the Fall. Logical. Common sense, even.

In order to start the MFA program, I needed to first fork out nearly $1500 in a matter of days. They did not offer me a payment plan even when I tried to explain to them-- Hey man, there isn't $1500 lying around under my mattress. Hey man, I'm living in it (rent). Which I can barely pay. I'm just trying to get ahead here. I am a working young person with little to no credit. I can't get a private student loan when I have no cosigner. Nor could I get a personal loan.

When I finally exhausted all of my options, I surrendered to the fate...that I kind of already saw coming.

That wasn't even the nail in the coffin, though.

Can I take a semester off to pay this off?

Admissions requires $500 for a 12 month deferment. BY MONDAY. Let me just go pick money from my money tree out back. Not only do I have to wait an entire school year, but I need to pay a tuition deposit for the f'ing tuition I am not even f'ing paying.

So tell me, does colleges have the student's best interest in mind? Because, excuse my french but, all I smell coming out of this university is bullshit.

Comments

[ringlat.livejournal.com]

What Swedes and Icelanders seem to think is American food, or what's advertised as American (got some input from my wife too, which is in quotes):

Cereal "not plain cornflakes or oatmeal but definitely any chocolate or rainbow-coloured cereal, flavoured oatmeal, any cereal that is actually candy", hamburgers "and layer-hamburgers" (double-deckers), chocolate-chip cookies "in sweden when you say 'cookies' you mean chocolate chip cookies because we think you don't have any other cookies", "chicken in a bucket", popcorn, "hotdogs with ketchup on and the ketchup is a zigzag".

Turkey, BBQ, marshmallows, s'mores, jello, jelly, french fries, pulled pork/chicken/beef, Coca Cola, root beer, cream soda, and all other sodas that aren't simply fruit or malt flavour.

Cupcakes, doughnuts, hoagies "sandwiches that are like tall or long and have layers and are a really big sandwich like in cartoons or at subway", bagels, melted cheese on most things but especially macaroni and cheese. BTW American cheese itself is very unique and so is the butter, the amount of fat in it is different from here in Europe and America's also allowed to put food dye in stuff like cheese if it wants. So "orange" food and cheese doesn't exist here, neither is the cheese really spongy or stringy.

"Eating take-out food that comes in a box is very American, even if Chinese food isn't American the fact that it comes in a box is. For us this is only in cartoons, we go to the Chinese restaurant to pick up the food ourselves, there's no take-out". "When I heard about macaroni and cheese I thought it was just macaroni with a simple cheese sauce (with other things like onion and ham in it), I didn't realize it was literally just macaroni and cheese."

"We don't eat peanut butter. you have like peanut butter cake with peanut butter chocolate frosting."

Anything deep fried or BBQ, pumpkin, peanut butter, or maple-flavoured (though maple syrup also traditionally exists here, they just don't eat it). Basically ALL instant food and "microwave food" (ex. mug cakes) but also instant mixes (ex. cake mix). They also don't have frosting here, if anything they have glaze instead or use egg-cream or plain whipped cream. Their cakes are always just like whipped cream with fruit and maybe marzipan, nuts or chocolate. That or what they call cake is just like bread with fruit in it. There's no "cakes" that are like entirely white bread and sugar with nothing else (which is the most typical American cake).

Basically all desserts and pastries that are sold in America are "American". For example, we have muffins but they're never poppyseed and if they're "blueberry" that means they have blueberry jam on the bottom-inside, not that they have full blueberries mixed in with the dough. Thin-crust pizza isn't seen as American but definitely pepperoni and deep-dish pizza is. I also saw "American BBQ chicken pizza" being sold once.

Ants on a log, tunafish sandwiches, pancakes with fruit or chocolate in them. Corn dogs, elephant ears and other fair food is stuff no one's ever even heard of here. Apple-cinnamon-clove ("pumpkin spice") flavour isn't really used here, instead they use ex. just clove and orange, and then they call it "Christmas spice". Here there's no grape, cherry, lime, pizza or jalapeno flavoured anything (unless it's an American import or copy of some American food), instead Swedes have elderflower, pear, onion, dill, chili pepper flavours. Ranch flavour for chips is American, it sometimes even gets called "Cool American".

All sorts of taco, nacho, tortilla, tortilla chip things are seen as American. Generally speaking, spicy sauces are "American" and generally speaking, so is ketchup. Pork and beans is American though I don't know how many people know about it (here they have pork-and-pea-soup instead).

I asked "What about chowder and relish?" and she said "I didn't know what they were, I've never seen/had it in real life so I don't know what it is."

Here, somehow Swedes have gotten the mistaken impression that in order to be a hardcore videogamer you have to eat American junk food, and so they sell that kind of stuff at the videogame store : l

Here's what the Swedish big grocery store chain thinks is American food:
http://www.ica.se/recept/amerikansk/