September 1st, 2010
generosity
As part of the Courageous Year, there’s a members-only online community where people can connect and get to know one another, and I’ve taken to posting some weekly themes that people can add to their experience: words like passion and integrity come up. This week, the theme was generosity.
As it happens, I was looking through my college transcripts because I’m planning to apply for MFT programs and for some of them, there are prerequisites. One of my majors in college was Sociology, and I was curious to see if anything I’d taken for Sociology could fulfill a pre-req.
As I re-read the transcripts, I found myself smiling, remembering the classes. I remembered which ones I liked and which ones annoyed me, but overwhelmingly I thought to myself, “Wow. I got a really great education.” Truly, I did. I think back to the books my professors had us reading, the assignments we were given, the ways in which we were encouraged to think, to be engaged in a classroom, to look beyond the obvious, to think critically, and there’s just no doubt in my mind–I received a truly exceptional education.
When one goes to college and fills out a FAFSA, your parents’ income from the previous year is what is used to calculate your aid package. My freshman year, the FAFSA reportings were $17,000…
…for a family of three.
I attended Lake Forest College initially because I knew someone who was going there and had an opportunity to visit the campus, and later because they offered me an amazing financial aid package. It was only later that I would realize what a truly amazing education I was given.
And–I do mean “given.”
Somehow–and I simply do not know how this is possible–somehow, it did not fully hit me on all levels until I was reviewing these transcripts yesterday, just how much was given so that I could attend school. The years that I went to LFC, the cost of attendance per year was $28,000. Each year, I took out approximately $3,000 in student loans (the most I could), and paid $3,000 out of pocket from working. The rest was subsidized by the College.
That means that someone–many someones–contributed more than $80,000 so that I could have a cut-rate education.
As I fully grasped this, sitting in my office all these years later, tears began to flow. I am the second person on both sides of my family to graduate from college. I am the only one with a master’s degree.
There are simply no words for me to convey how much I appreciate–truly, deep down, from the bottom of my soul appreciate–the generosity of the people who gave to Lake Forest so that others without means could attend.
Generosity is not just lip-service. It is not something we do because it makes us feel better, because it asserts that we are a good person. My guess is that anyone who helped to pay for my education could have done any number of things with that money.
Instead, they opted to do something that would change a life. I often tell my students that an education is the best investment anyone can make, because there is nothing else in life that will be with you, always. Once you have a college degree, you will always be “a college graduate.” The same cannot be said about cars or clothes or money or even family or friends, but it can be said that you earned your education.
Today, I am so thankful–so grateful–for the generosity that touches others. It lights a fire in me to give back. To tip big. To stop asking myself if it’s worth it and, as Danielle LaPorte says, “Give until it hurts.”
