The Greatest Lessons Aren't Free by Morgan

The Greatest Lessons Aren't Free by Morgan - June 2016 Scholarship Essay

My parents always told me that if I worked hard and earned good grades that my college education would be paid for. So that is exactly what I did. Even though the books tell you not to "sweat the small stuff," I worried over every test, homework assignment, project, and essay until I was sure I had achieved an inarguable "A."

What I had no way of knowing was that the supportive family I grew up in would officially crumble all around me during the fall of my senior year in high school. This was when my parent's divorce was finalized after a very scary period of separation. My mom received sole custody of my brother, sister, and myself along with my new baby sister. She had been a stay at home mom since I was very little; the cookie baking kind of mom that volunteered and threw elaborate class parties. Now, there she was working to find a way to support all of us financially, while also caring for a new infant. Our financial situation had changed drastically overnight. The realization hit me hard that if I was going to college - I would have to pay for it myself. My life had taken a Cinderella turn . . . only backwards.

Accepted into my dream school, Baylor University, I was excited to pursue my undergraduate degree; the first step to reaching my goal of being a physical therapist. My only problem was I had no idea how I would pay the tuition. Honestly, living in Oregon, there were moments when I simply worried about affording the plane ticket to Texas. More than any homework assignment, the biggest academic challenge I would face would be to find a way to get to college and then pay my tuition to stay there.

Thankfully, all of the encouragement to get good grades would be the very thing that would make my freshman year in college affordable. I graduated salutatorian among my high school class with a GPA of 4.26 and was gratefully awarded a large merit scholarship along with several Grants. The news of this financial help came during a dark time when I was wondering if I would be able to go to college at all!

I continue to pursue high grades, hoping this will enable me to land more scholarships and grants, knowing that I have seven more years of college to pay for. I try not to let the enormity of it all overwhelm me.

Last year, at the beginning of the second semester, I sat quietly staring at two documents, one in each hand. In my left hand I had a bank statement revealing an unimpressive balance of $32.10. In my right hand I held a tuition bill demanding a number so highly unrealistic, I was sure I was imagining it. With a lump in my throat, I walked to Baylor's financial aid office and applied for my first student loan. I know this sounds Pollyannaish, but I am hoping this first loan will also be my last.

How am I going to pay for seven years of college without debt? I am going to work hard. Whether I am working at yet another job, schoolwork, your scholarship application, or fighting the doubts and fears that tell me I can't do this; I will work hard and push through it. I don't expect it to be easy and I know I won't have a free ride.

In the end, I know this experience is not meaningless. I believe these unexpected challenges I face will shape me, enabling me to have empathy, strength, and understanding for my future physical therapy patients who may find themselves in a similar situation. An unforeseen turn of events in their lives may leave them wondering if it is hopeless to try. I will tell them my story, explaining how I took it one day at a time, working to achieve my goals despite all of the obstacles. Then I will encourage them to do the same.

Truthfully, I already have a great sense of empathy for my future patients. My passion for physical therapy grew from my own personal experience after suffering a cheerleading injury in which two areas in my lower spine cracked permanently. I learned during my junior year in high school that not only would I never cheer again; I would never be able to run again either. Surgery could not fix the damage, but physical therapy saved me by giving me something to work towards every day to strengthen the weakest areas in my lower back. Therapy was hard work, yet the academic challenge I'm facing now to creatively find ways to pay for college is even harder.

This experience has taught me that I am stronger than I thought I ever could be. When I first realized I would have to support myself through college, it seemed an insurmountable mountain to climb; an impossibility. Yet here I am. I've finished my first year in college and am now looking forward to starting my sophomore year. In the end, life seems to be a sort of school which offers its own set of challenging classes and tests. The only way to survive is to take it one lesson at a time, one day at a time, trusting that each lesson is preparing you for the next.