For the past couple of Saturdays, I have been participating in a NY Cares Volunteer project called FAFSA Prep.
Myself and a group of about 8 other volunteers go to high schools around the city to help graduating seniors and their parents fill out and submit their Fafsa forms. The fafsa is the financial aid forms in which you can get money from the government to help you go to school for people that can't afford all of the costs of education.
I picked this project because I think it's absolutely life-changing.
My mom was working as a medical transcriptionist while I was growing up. She made something like $25k or $28k annually with 3 kids in the house. I think, at best, we received $1200/mth for child support from my dad who opted to not work or make very minimal so he wouldn't have to pay much child support. So I guess that puts us up to an extra $14k or something. Basically, there was just not a lot of money there for my family to put toward me to go to school.
I filled out the fafsa and received the maximum amount ..which was something like $4k per year to college expenses. The fafsa also allows you to access government loans and work-study programs. It's giving people a chance to get an education, who for monetary reasons, could likely not afford to get that. YAY, AMERICA!
Although, I still would have gone to school if I couldn't have got FAFSA money, it definitely changed the trajectory. it changed what I was able to do and how bogged down I was (or wasn't) after I completed college. Basically huge effects when you think about it!
So we were given a refresher, and have a manually, and each Saturday, spend 3 hours to sit with senior students and their mom and/or dad and help them fill in and submit all the information.
The first weekend was a school for asian studies on the lower east side! the students and staff were just fantastic!! high school seniors are just funny! some of them still sooo awkward, but most of these kids were very nice.
The second school was up in the bronx.
The third school was an art and design school in midtown.
and today's school is in east harlem..i'll just get on the express bus and shoot up there.
some of the students bring their parents. this is fun to see. just to get a view of a family of these lives that are so different than mine. I've never looked at a high school student from the view of their parent. or looked at the parent from the view of the high school student...with my 28yo eyes really behind both.
it's cute to see the parents so excited yet so unknowing. A lot of these parents don't seem to be first generation Americans. I've seen green cards and (some of) the students from the first school I met had only been in the states for a couple of years, before that were in China.
it makes me really happy to play a small part in this. some of the kids whiz through the forms and for others we have to help them pull information off of their parents taxes or help them to understand why they wants to be considered a dependent..things like that.
I pray for some world-changers to be in this bunch.
i think education is so important. it's a chance. it's something that can never be taken away. it's a hope for a better future.
excited to play a small part in couple of kids finding their way to their future and being able to afford, if only a little better or a lot better, their way to it.
today is the last Saturday (i think it was supposed to be 8, but looks like just 4 or 5). hope you all are having a lovely Saturday! XO XO
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