June 2017: Student Spotlight featuring Matt Powers
Picking Myself Up from My Bootstraps
The first semester of my sophomore year of college was a rocky one. I was balancing two majors, English and Computer Science, and I was having trouble with the workload from both since the content had little to do with each other. My GPA was suffering during that first semester and it was partially because I was increasingly stressed by emails from the bursar’s office, which put holds on my Villanova account due to the incompletion of the IRS data retrieval tool, a requirement to complete FAFSA. Due to these issues, I was forced to withdraw from Villanova for the second semester of my sophomore year since my family’s taxes could not be retrieved using this tool and I could not take out a loan for the semester until the process was completed.
During my semester away from Villanova, I was so disappointed in myself. I got a part-time job cutting deli meat at a local ShopRite that I hated. I had to ride my bicycle there each day since I had no car or any money. I decided that I’d get my mind and body right while I wasn’t in school. After all, why did education have to be confined to college? I spent a lot of time reading books from the library. A friend of mine who went to school nearby would often ask me to go on photoshoots in New York City on the weekends. These journeys were the only creative outlet I had and I still look back on them fondly. Still, I felt guilty about all the loans accumulating. For a time, I worked two jobs until I quit the job at Shoprite to make more money as a full-time bike messenger in nearby New York City. The work was not easy, but I enjoyed being outside despite the bustle and danger of Manhattan’s traffic. As for my education, I wanted to go to a cheaper school and give my parents a break, thus I decided to fill out a transfer application for Rutgers which offers in-state subsidized tuition.
It was not until late in the spring, as the Rutger’s transfer application deadline was nearing, that my mom realized the error. When filing taxes late, you must send your items to a very specific IRS location, and my mom sent them to the location for filing taxes on time, so they promptly threw her paperwork out. I was stuck between a rock and a hard place: I needed my transcripts to transfer schools and I needed to pay my bill from that semester with a loan to remove the holds and retrieve my transcripts. It wasn’t until late in the summer of 2015 that the taxes were appropriately filed and my FAFSA items were completed. Having not had sufficient time to remove the holds on my VU account, retrieve my transcripts, and subsequently transfer, I returned to Villanova in the fall of my junior year, just happy to be back, though still accumulating a great deal of loans. All the financial aid that Villanova offered me for my sophomore year was rescinded due to the time it took to resolve the issue, so I took out a loan for the entire amount to avoid delaying college and further wasting time.
Come fall, I was back at school and living off campus with friends. My parents were paying my portion of the rent out of pocket and I had no car for the first semester. I got rides from the people I was living with and paid for groceries with my credit card, while I applying to various part-time jobs. Returning to school was an adjustment period, but I was always a good student and the semester off didn’t change that. After my parents purchased and fixed a cheap, used car for me, I got a part-time job at the Gladwyne Market.
I was cruising through another semester at Villanova when I got an email from the Blue White Scholarship Foundation. I immediately applied since I was very aware of the financial hole that I was digging myself into. I was the perfect candidate since the foundation emphasized academic achievement and hard work. The application specified that one needed a recommendation from an employer in order to receive the scholarship, so I asked the owner of the Gladwyne Market who was kind enough to oblige me as I had never missed a shift. I finished up another strong semester in 2016 in which I overloaded on classes again while maintaining my part-time job at the Gladwyne Market. Things took a turn for the better in the summer of 2016 when I got an internship at a great company, SAP, and was lucky enough to receive the Blue White Scholarship.
This was a great time for me. I was doing well at my internship and prepared to finish at Villanova. I no longer felt guilty for the financial burden I put on my parents as I was helping to pay utilities with the money I made from my internship and I had received the Blue White Scholarship to help to offset the cost of the loans. Additionally, my dad articulated that he felt a great deal of pride that his son attended Villanova, despite the price tag. He told me time and time again not to worry about paying for school, since he planned to pay every penny. Disaster struck in October of 2016 when my father was diagnosed with Glioblastoma, an incurable brain cancer. When Kate Cellucci, director of the Blue and White Foundation, heard of my dad’s illness she immediately comforted me, letting me know that she’d be there for me through it all and when my dad passed away in January, she even sent flowers to my mourning mother. I can’t thank Kate and Joe enough for everything the Blue White Scholarship Foundation does, not just for me, but for every student who is facing some very adult responsibilities with little to no warning or assistance.
I’m still excelling academically as I continue to write and create marketing or narrative content through pictures. Through Villanova and SAP, I’ve become adept with cameras and editing media content with the Adobe Creative Suite. In my Advanced Film Class I’m producing and directing a short film that I wrote entitle “Youth Vandalized,” based on the summer of 2015. The narrative follows a trio of young men, based on myself and two friends, who are biking to Fort Tilden, a remote beach at the tip of Brooklyn. My goal is to enter the film into a festival and enter the film industry as a low-level production assistant. Meanwhile, SAP has expressed interest in retaining me to generate content for their social media channels. I guess I’ll just have to wait and see where the future takes me.
