College? Never Heard of Her.

As a senior who is just three weeks away from graduating high school, I can now say what is appropriate for college prep. My freshman year of high school I was required to take a class that taught me about possible career choices and different colleges that offer a major viable with my career choice. As a freshman I had an idea of what I could possibly see myself doing or some careers that I thought would be fun, but never really knew much about it. I remember I had to choose my top three career choices: marine biology, orthodontics, or being a surgeon. What a laugh, now I am going to get my associate degree in nursing to make my way up to a nurse practitioner. Things change through a course of four years.

The students in my class briefly went over money and what some colleges cost, but I never truly understood what we were talking about. As a freshman I was struggling as I was trying to navigate my way through my first year of high school. It seems a little bizarre that you would ask a bunch of 14 to 15-year-olds what college they want to go to and what they want to spend the rest of their lives doing even though some of them are just hitting puberty. Instead, the criteria should be teaching juniors and seniors classes on different things they might come across in college. I wish my junior year someone could have at least mentioned college to me. I didn’t know how to apply, what about scholarships?, and where should I go to get a degree that will financially benefit me. Not to mention that no one even mentioned what FAFSA was until the deadline to apply was three days away.

My mother and I filled out my FAFSA information, but I had no idea what I was doing. I was so confused and not to mention they mentioned how much money they are willing to give me, and it still does not make sense to me. I do not understand how I am supposed to put that towards what I will end up paying for college with. This year there is free community college for students that graduate in my class and a few others that can apply for a FAFSA scholarship. I have no idea how to do that, and I attend school starting in September. I also barely knew which scholarships to apply for or where to even start. I think that instead of expecting seniors to figure it out based on memory, they should offer a class to us students that gives them time to work on specifically college related things with the help of someone who knows what they are talking about.

Granted, the pandemic got in the way of things so it made communicating with my class a little harder, but that shouldn’t be an excuse. I had no idea what I was doing and if you think I remember anything I was taught my freshman year well then, I got news pal, I don’t. I barely made up my mind to go twenty minutes up the road to CMCC, the most generic college any student in Androscoggin or Kennebunk County can choose to go to. I’m just highly disappointed in how everything college related went at least on my end. I’m not sure how other students felt about their college prep but mine was unrewarding.

If it wasn’t for some of my graduated friends that play on the CMCC women’s soccer team, I would probably be doing a gap year and working to save money instead. I got introduced to the soccer team during the summer going into my senior year. I was hesitant and ultimately told the coach I wasn’t going to play for him but let me tell you, he is one persistent man. He emailed me and showed up to my soccer games and watched me play. He would always tell me that I was number one on his recruitment list and that he didn’t want to take no for an answer. After my games he’d make comments like “I’d love to see you play like that on my field next year” again, persuasive with his words. This coach is mainly why I chose where I am going next year. Still had the help of some of my past teammates to get me there.

All in all, I think that schools should have better systems on educating students that want to go to college. It doesn’t need to be a requirement for every student, but it should be offered to the students that want to attend college in their future. There could be other classes too that help with trade school or any other type of future choice of a student. Transferring into college or the adult real world is stressful enough. High schools should help relieve that stress and make things easier for the students and give them the appropriate education on what college even is.

“college memories” by Sean MacEntee is licensed under CC BY 2.0.Copy text