ElenaLee blogs at Our Place. A blogger I very much respect once spoke of events in her life bringing both a gift and a wound. A gift and a wound—I carry this imagery with me like a familiar piece of jewelry or some small memento, some reminder of where I have been and of where I hope to go. The
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In May of 2014, I graduated with my Bachelor of Honour’s Degree, with a major in Sociology. As I prepared to walk across the stage to receive my degree, I reflected on my experiences that had brought me here to this moment — from kindergarten through my final project in my fourth year of my undergraduate program. This was an
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HA note: Lana Hope’s story was originally published on her blog Wide Open Ground on October 1, 2015. It is reprinted with her permission. In my post College after Homeschooling, I explained why college was emotionally difficult on me. My main argument in that post was that I was not intellectually able to assent to what my professors were trying to
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HA note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “Salome” is a pseudonym. My experience going from homeschooling to college has been a mixed bag… but one I wouldn’t change for the world, no matter how shitty it was at the time. I have grown a lot and become a lot more normal, and rejected much of the
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Editorial note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “Aisling” is a pseudonym. The heavy wooden door to my dorm room closed with a definitive click behind my parents. I exhaled the weight of eighteen years spent wrestling for control, for individuality, for personhood. I was free. I imagined this moment often, with ever-increasing fervor as the end
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Muriel blogs at StoryCache. As I’m sitting here contemplating my homeschool-to-college story and how to write about it, I think of all the other stories my homeschool brothers and sisters will have to tell alongside mine, and I think… “I’m one of the lucky ones.” For all the positive stories of a seamless transition, I expect there to be war
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HA note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “Latebloomer” is a pseudonym. Latebloomer’s story was originally published on her blog Past Tense, Present Progressive. It is reprinted with her permission. There was always an expectation in my family that I would go to college. Both of my parents had a college education and saw its value, and they didn’t
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Stepping onto a college campus for the first time was not a big deal for me. I was ready to leave home. Tired of the monotony, drudgery of my daily life at home, I was excited to move on to bigger and better things. Thankfully, my parents had never encouraged me to believe the typical mantras that many of our
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HA note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “Savannah” is a pseudonym. If you’re not going to go to a Christian college, you have to make sure your faith is rock-solid by the time you graduate high school. Because college—especially professors of the humanities like psychology and social studies—hates you. College is the epitome of “the world”.
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HA note: The author’s name has been changed to ensure anonymity. “LJ Lamb” is a pseudonym. Nothing prepared me for the shock that my homeschooling experience was woefully inadequate. Despite getting an extremely high score on the test that asked about my ability to read and do basic maths, I quickly discovered that I didn’t know what I needed to
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