miracles do happen after all

I haven’t talked much about the whole college thing, mostly because I wasn’t sure it was going to happen after all.  I mean, eventually, yes, definitely, but not necessarily this year.  The difference in tuition costs for a resident vs. a non-resident is staggering, and even after Stafford loans and a couple grants, I still found myself about $11,000 short.  And yes, I could go to private lenders, but I really don’t want to do that;  the idea of being $25,000 in debt after only my first year wasn’t appealing at all.

So, I figured I’d put it off a year… not the end of the world by any means, but I was pretty disappointed.  College is the reason I moved out here, after all!

In today’s mail was a thin little letter from Eastern’s financial aid office, and this is how it started…

Congratulations on your successful academic achievements! We are pleased to offer you the Transfer Scholarship and the National Scholars Program beginning the fall 2009 semester for undergraduate study at Eastern Michigan University.

…and it ended with me jumping around the living room, squeaking and saying OHMYGOD! over and over, because I just got almost $15,000 worth of scholarships.  I am absolutely jubilant.

Of course, there’s a teeny tiny bit of sheepishness, because almost $14,000 of that is based on my past (previous college) academic achievement – aka, my GPA – which is a funny story in and of itself.  I was somehow under the impression that I did horribly in college the first time around, which also played heavily in my reluctance to go back.  Then, in the process of moving, I found my [unopened!] final transcript from OCCC, opened it, and realized I’d dropped out with a 3.2 GPA and a mere 15 credits to go till my A.S.  Whoops.

Anyway, so today is pretty much the best day ever and although I know only a couple people read this – and mostly people who already knew this news anyway – I had to share.

And by the way, that job I got back in early May?  I quit it a couple weeks ago.  I didn’t move all this way to be back in the same kind of overworking-underpaying-crap job I left behind in Maine.  I’m aiming for bigger and better things these days.

Crafty things tomorrow!

~ by Casey on 25 June 2009.