My Shameful Confession...

...and there it is.  The Question.  The one that I dread, that comes up at least 2-3 times a week now that orientation week is over (orientation week saw it popping up daily).  The question that really truly defines my place at this , or I suppose any, world class university.  Not "did you get in?"  Not "what's the focus of your research?"  Not "what made you choose to apply to Cambridge?"  Or even "Where did you do your undergrad?"

Nope.

The Question is "how are you funded?  AKA "does anyone besides you really think you might actually belong here?"  AKA "are you really intelligent enough to merit a place here?"  AKA "Where did you land on the list of candidates?  Near the top--a student who brought such insight that we demanded they come, or did you barely scrape by?"  The Question susses out those who will go on to successful careers in academia, business, economics, etc. and who will simply be a slightly better off middle class person, occasionally skimming articles written and published by one of our more academically focused PhD holding peers.  Funding is designed to ensure that the best and brightest students spend their time at Cambridge focused on becoming the next generation of academic thinkers and global policy advisers, and despite not being a "scholar" of any kind, I really believe that those who did get funding most likely in all cases, were the best candidates selected.

That said, I've been carefully crafting my answer to The Question for the last week.  Since my bus pulled up on campus and I figured out post-haste that The Question was important.  "Funding?  OOOOHHHHHH."  In my mind I have this big understanding smile.  In real life I'm just sort of embarrassed and ready to run.  "Funding."  I've rehearsed it;

"Well, in 1965 the Congress of the United States followed in the footsteps of the 1958 National Defense Education Act, and offered to all US citizens attending eligible universities, the opportunity to succeed by establishing..."  I usually make it as far as "well...."  You see people who are funded start their answers with "I am a," followed by the name of the organization that funded them, and the fact that they are a scholar.  Those who can simply pay for the cost out of pocket usually have some magic social skills.  I don't know how, but you can just tell that funding isn't a question that they need to be asked.

It's the middle group.  Those of us in bluejeans whose collars are starting to fray. By the time the first consonant is out of my mouth it's clear that I have not started my sentence in the acceptable manner.  I, it has become apparent to whomever is listening, am not a scholar.  Nor am I coiffed.  Infrequently I will pull off confident, but that really depends on the day.  That "well" is when people start looking at their feet.  Or avoiding eye contact.  Or humming and hawing their way out of the conversation.

Apparently far fewer people are interested in the political situation surrounding the origins of the US Student Loan Program than I might have thought.

Here's the thing though.  There are quite a few "self funded" students.  I've met dozens of folks who are getting parental support, or help from a grandmother or whose families planned around paying for College and Graduate School.  Props to those families.  Just like I do think the University is making the best funding choices they can and selecting people who will really make the world a better place for us all to receive funding, I also strongly support the idea of families, who can afford it, helping each other out.  Seriously: props.

For me, this is the culmination of a lifelong dream.  A dream that somehow landed in my 11 year old mind when I declared I was going to go to Harvard and find dinosaur bones with feathers attached and write a paper about it.  My limited middle-school understanding of geography was not important, because it wasn't a place somewhere on the East Coast that I wanted to go.  It was an idea.  The idea of academia.  Of lectures and tests and reading until my eyes bled.  The eventual dream of maybe teaching, hosting discussions and even traveling a little to learn.  The topics changed as I grew older.  Paleontology morphed to archaeology and then anthropology.  Sociology shifted to Politics and Government and by the time I'd graduated from Pacific University I'd applied for scholarships and graduate schools all over the world.

Marshall, Gates, Rhodes. Fulbright.  Oxford, Harvard, Boston College, UC Berkley.  Why not?  Thought 22 year old Callie.  College was awesome, a graduate degree would be even more mind-blowingly-fun.  Then the inevitable letters came rolling in;

"We regret to inform you..."
"There was a record number of highly qualified candidates..."
"The committee struggles each year with their decision....."

Bit by bit I got my pride handed back to me on a plate.  I learned what "overshooting" means and how valuable humility can be--even if it just makes you pick a back-up school.  One "safe" application I had never made.
Graduate school, it seemed, was not for me that year.
Or the next.
Or the next.
I learned how to use microsoft outlook, and how to handle a screaming customer on the phone.  I bought a bike and began improv classes.  I settled into "life" because that's what you do.  And it was a good life to settle into.  Solid job, good friends, fun hobby.

And then, on a whim when I thought I might lose my job because of layoffs, I took one last risk.  Better to be in school than unemployed.  So I applied to Portland State University (again).  Essays polished and transcripts on hand, I took my shot in the dark.  I applied to study at Cambridge (and to a scholarship to fund part of it). To this day I'm still not even sure why.

8 months later I woke up in the middle of the night to an email coming in on my new smartphone whose 2 year plan I had just activated, read an email from the Graduate Board at the University of Cambridge, and started to cry.

Not because I "got in" (although that was unbelievable--literally), and not because I did not get the scholarship (quite believeable actually) but because 26 year old me knew something that 22 year old me never did.  Opportunities come to those who create them, but even those people only get them once in a great while.  And this, I knew was the sort of opportunity that would be tied to risk.  I cried because I knew I had a decision to make.  Did I stay home, take no risk, but keep my job (which I liked), and hung out with my friends (whom I adore) or did I risk everything for the next 10-25 years just to go back to school?  Without a scholarship, without funding and without help from my family (the situation doesn't allow for it--do NOT ask) my choice boiled down to stay where things are financially "safe" or take a deep breath, dive in, and know that the only person I can rely on to get me back up to where there is air to breathe is me.

So I'm diving.  Arcing gracefully down into the ice-cold water of somewhere completely new, knowing that not everyone gets the choice of whether or not to pursue their childhood dream.  That risk is an honor--and that's something I wish I could convey to every person who ever pauses awkwardly when I mention I came here on loans.  That, for me, it is the chance of a lifetime to sign off on my student loans.  An adventure to step into the unknown professionally and personally, and the rare moment in which I can try to fulfill a childhood dream.

And guess what?  If I weren't willing to work my butt off and do everything in my power to make that dream happen, if I only wanted it when it was easy, it wouldn't be a true dream.

But I certainly wouldn't appreciate it, the way I am already appreciating this year--and when I meet other students who traveled the world to come here, and who are also shaking their heads at how plasma is donated instead of sold, and how hard it is to not work full time, I shake their hands proudly.  Because even if they won't be field-changing, earth shattering brilliant minds, I know how hard they worked to be here.  So I know how hard they'll work to have an impact when they leave.

So congrats to all---and to those of you who are considering taking a risk: do it.  And don't look back.