Screenshot from accessboston.org

I’m currently in the midst of a traditional rite of passage for American college students: the summer internship.  Many of my peers chose to spend their summers doing grunt work at law offices, hospitals, or financial consulting groups.

I decided to do my internship as the media manager for a nonprofit called the Action Center for Undergraduate Services and Scholarships (or ACCESS for short). ACCESS provides free financial aid advice and advocacy to high students and their families in Boston and Springfield, Massachusetts, to help them overcome financial barriers to higher education.

I didn’t know how much I didn’t know

I’m attending college largely thanks to financial aid: Princeton, my school, was recently included on a Washington Post list of the nation’s top-12 loan-free aid policies, and I’m a grateful recipient of a yearly grant from the University.  As such, I came to ACCESS thinking that I was pretty well-versed in the financial aid process of FAFSAs, CSS profiles, and scholarship applications, but the past two months here have shown me that my experiences barely scratched the surface of higher education financing.

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Screen grab from the Princeton Undergraduate Women's Leadership report (Click to enlarge)

Last month, my friends and I here at Princeton were surprised and dismayed to read a report from the university’s “Steering Committee on Undergraduate Women’s Leadership” that claimed that today’s female undergraduates are taking fewer leadership roles – the first time there’s been a downward trend in female leadership since the university started admitting women.

The study found that many women work behind-the-scenes in non-elected positions for campus groups, rather than pursuing visible roles themselves, and that women do not assert themselves in class discussions even though they tend to outperform men academically.

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When Tyler Clementi, a freshman at Rutger’s University, committed suicide last month after being bullied for his sexual orientation, it hit home for Princeton students. We typically consider ourselves a welcoming place for gay students, but in the wake of this incident, we’ve been forced to reexamine how welcoming we really are.

Clementi, an eighteen-year-old freshman at Rutgers, jumped off the George Washington Bridge in New York on September 22, after his roommate broadcast a video on the internet of Clementi’s sexual encounter with another man.

Effect on Princeton students

In the days immediately following the incident, it seemed like Clementi’s death was everywhere on Princeton’s campus.  His suicide was so close to home—Princeton is a mere 18.3 miles away from Rutgers by car—that it really scared some people, and the fact that Molly Wei was a Princeton Junction native meant that the event was constantly present in the local news.

“I think the closeness did have a definite effect on us,” said Christina Henricks, a Princeton sophomore who has been active in events at Princeton’s LGBT Center since she arrived here last fall. “It happened nearby, rather than in another state, and that makes it much more relatable.”

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As the leaves start to turn and we finally get some autumnal weather in New Jersey, life here at Princeton is settling into its normal vibe of constant, city-never-sleeps activity.  Since we start in mid-September, later than most other American universities, classes are just now kicking into high gear; extra-curricular clubs are in full swing; and the freshmen are becoming more jaded as the glamor of college life becomes routine.  Though I only moved back to campus three weeks ago, it feels like I’ve lived here forever.

With the new season also comes an overflowing schedule.  Along with everyone else on campus, I’m guilty of packing approximately 48 hours’ worth of activities into each day, which gives me my fair share of chaotic days and too-late nights. Despite all the extra work, though, my extra-curricular groups are a big part of what makes my college experience so great.

This semester, I’m directing and producing a full-blown musical on campus, which means that my time spent away from my studies has been increasingly dominated by auditions, rehearsals, and meetings with my design team.
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