by Cyn Bagley

Created on: August 02, 2011

Since it has been several years since I went to college, this reflection might seem useless in this modern world of electronic gadgets, but when I first went to college in 1982 we wrote our papers on yellow pads and then typed them using a manual typewriter. We didn't know any better. And even the poorest students today seem to have the use of a computer or laptop. So we were much poorer than even when you take in account the recession.

So let me get on with it. I knew that I didn't have much money when I started to go to school. I had just spent two years saving enough money so that I could go to a semester of college at BYU in Provo, Utah. A friend of mine, who was an Occupational Therapist, suggested that I try to apply for assistance at the Financial Office. It was when I sat in front of one of the clerks and discussed my money problems that I realized that I was one of those students that was going to fall through the cracks. I was young, white, and blonde. Although I was paying for college with my own money, the clerk insisted that I needed to know my parents yearly income. She was even kind enough to give me a cut-off to how much I could get by how little my parents made.

Unfortunately, when I suggested that my parents obligations, eight children at home, would make me poor, the clerk just laughed. In her words, if they were able to have that many children, they should be able to pay for my college. So I realized that I was on my own. If I made it through college, it would be a miracle.

During the three to four semesters with this college, I had two jobs - one as a janitor with the college and one as an apartment complex manager, plus I was a full-time student.

So as a poor student in college, I was running all the time. I rarely slept and I was always tired. I would fall asleep in physics class. Eventually I realized that I couldn't continue. My health couldn't take the lack of sleep and food. I ate a lot of eighteen cent ramen noodles.

It was at this point that I looked for another solution. In my first semester I realized that financial support was not in my future. Plus I didn't want to owe a lot of money after I finished my education, which naturally led me towards the military. After six years as an electronics technician, I was able to finish my education with the G.I. bill. And better yet, I didn't owe anyone a dime.

Although getting an education was financially hard, it was more important to me than to my classmates. For instance, I didn't have the money to go to the football games, so I volunteered to clean the stadium so that I could watch the game. It meant more to me than to the student, whose father paid for her tickets. Plus I would save my pennies and nickels so that I could go to the movies. I appreciated the free events like the Friday Night Jazz performances from the students.

And when I finally received my degree in English Literature, I stood in front of all my classmates as their top student. When the roar of six hundred students filled the stadium, I had that tingle. I had finally made it.

Poor just means you have to work harder and longer for that degree.

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