Slowly Getting Better

by Ryan McCombs

As she makes her, what seems like forever, 30-minute drive home from work at 10 o’clock at night, Jane Smith, not her real name, runs through all of the homework she has to do in her head. She’s going to be up all night. Again.

As a student on academic probation, Smith cannot work on campus. Her daily drive costs her time she could be using to stay on top of her schoolwork, and finally take herself off probation. Her already uphill battle becomes a lot steeper when she loses seven hours a day to work, five times a week.

“I found myself falling behind every time that I had work. I would leave campus at 4 and not get back until 11 and I just didn’t have any energy left to get my work done,” she said.

Smith dealt with a lot of non-school related issues her freshman year that led her to enter academic probation. She had surgery on her teeth, was depressed, and a family member died. All of which directly affected her grades. She started off strong with a high GPA her first semester at Franklin Pierce, but it quickly started dropping the more these issues weighed on her, particularly her depression. By second semester, it took a lot just to get out of bed. The further into the semester she got, the more classes she missed. “It began to feel like I was drowning. Everything started to pile up and it just started to overwhelm me. It became too much,” she said.

In the break between semesters, Smith had to appeal her probation with the school. She got the confidence and feeling of self-worth she had been searching for when two of her professors wrote letters to the school explaining why she should be here and describing her great qualities. It was everything she needed to hear.

Through the first month of the semester, her grades are thriving, and she is now looking for a job closer to campus. She doesn’t have it all figured out but she’s getting there.