Roommates overcome odds to enroll in Franklin College
Stacey McClelland says a campus visit changed her mind about college and made her think: "Maybe I can make it."
Stacey McClelland and LuShawna Wilson are two Hammond High graduates who now room together at Franklin College. Stacey wants to be an elementary school teacher; LuShawna, an orthodontist.
On the surface they don’t seem very different from the thousands of Indiana high school buddies who head off to college together. But the journey these two 19-year-olds took to get to Franklin might someday help to change the way low-income and minority youth gain access to postsecondary education.
LuShawna perseveres despite unstable family life
LuShawna spent the winter of her junior year in high school living in a hotel room with her family because her father could no longer pay the rent. She went to school, worked, studied on her 30-minute break at work, and ate sandwiches for weeks on end unless Kentucky Fried Chicken had a sale. At the same time, she served as president of the school’s Key Club. After an aunt and two cousins were murdered, the family moved in with relatives where heat, light and hot water were in short supply. She studied for her college course in Medical Terminology by a kerosene-powered lantern. She earned a C+ but knows she could have done better under different circumstances. In her senior year she was elected class president and re-elected president of the Key Club. She also worked hard to improve her grades because she realized how vital they were to her future.
In her college application essay, she wrote:
“With the proper education I can have a career and never have to worry about collecting unemployment. I can help out my family and make sure my younger sister doesn’t endure all that I had to. My education is important to me as well as my family.”
Stacey began her senior year of high school by watching her mother go off to jail. She remembers the moment at the beginning of her poignant application essay:
“Imagine you are 18-years-old.The worst thing that can ever happen is about to unfold.
Your mother is gettin’ ready to leave and as she does so,
You hold back tears and scream for her not to go.
She was incarcerated for eighteen months, but with good behavior, nine…
She tells you to take care of chores more so than you already do.
She reminds you to behave and to keep your head up.
Your throat feels funny from holding back tears; there's a lump.
She hugs you good-bye as she tells how much she loves you."
Somehow Stacey maintained her 3.1 grade point average, was captain of the school’s swim team and a member of the yearbook staff. Her mother was released from prison one week after Stacey graduated from high school.
College access workshops provide information, encouragement
During high school both students participated in workshops and education sessions as part of a Lumina Foundation-funded study with Dave Murray and the National Center for College Costs. The study’s goal is to test whether early college counseling can increase the number of low-income and minority students who go to college and successfully complete their postsecondary education.
The sessions taught the girls how important honors classes could be for potential scholarships, showed them how they could afford a private college with a combination of grants, loans, part-time jobs and scholarships, and helped them to polish their college application essays.
Stacey took a bus trip with fellow students to Franklin College her junior year. Wilson visited the campus with her parents and then took the bus trip her senior year.
“I never would have known the college was here if I hadn’t gone on that trip,” Stacey says. “It totally changed my mind about college. The program opens your eyes to everything, and you think: ‘Maybe I can make it,’ ” she says.
College has proved much more difficult than high school for both students. Each carries a full load of coursework, has at least one part-time job and is experiencing life as a college freshman. After the first semester one or both may have to repeat a class or two. They say they are up to the challenge and are concentrating on their schoolwork to improve their grades so they can continue to qualify for their scholarships.
Will they make it and earn a bachelor’s degree from Franklin? They are optimistic – after all, overcoming obstacles is nothing new to these young women.
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