we—happy—few:

Love my school

I got an email from my undergrad’s president, sent to all the alums. It took two reads for me to get what was actually saying—he was dancing around the point a bit. In short: enrollment for fall is way down, they’re still accepting late applications and they’re asking for recruitment help. My reaction was: dafuqqq?

Two reasons for this reaction:

A) This past semester you didn’t accept my little cousin, who is a straight A student. She’s going to Juniata now, on a full scholarship, and that’s working for her, but we were both fairly upset about it, you douchcanoes.

B) St. Mary’s always had super high enrollment. It was an extremely popular and academically prestigious school. We had issues with over-enrollment every year. SMCM would accept a certain number of students, assuming a certain percentage would choose to go elsewhere. This percentage was always wrong, even though it was adjusted every year. Too many students would choose St. Mary’s, and then we’d have to house them all. I remember two students in single rooms (I was in one of those frosh year), three students in doubles, and study rooms converted into quads. As the semester wore on, some kids inevitably couldn’t hack the academic workload and failed out or quit, and the housing situation would stabilize itself.

What I’m saying is, St. Mary’s has always been in high demand. We’ve always had more students who wanted to go there than we could handle, and that number has always been rising. What happened?

More to the point, what are you asking for tuition? It’s always been high, especially for out of state students. Is that what’s driving people away? Or is it something else?

I am over fond of SMCM. I know that. I’m worried about the future of the school. I discovered a strange thing today: no one wants an alum email that isn’t asking for money.

Urgo, the place was fine when I left it three years ago. What did you do to my school?

I just put two and two together and realized that NJLA is June 3-5, while SMCM alum weekend is June 7-9. That is going to be a heck of a week.

But it’s okay. Something tells me that after the one, I’ll need the other.

I just searched the Mary Prankster tag, and two of the first few posts were made by fellow SMCM alums. Way to go Seahawks? I don’t want to know what this says about our education. Was this our school song, or was it Wagon Wheel by Old Crow Medicine Show? Is it too close to call?

Pretty/interesting things should post occasionally without me by queue. I won’t be able to keep up with my dashboard, so if you want me to see something tag it with #missrumphiusproject .

I’m MD bound! I’m going to St. Mary’s College of Maryland alum weekend, so if you’re an SMCM person, and you’ll also be there, hit me up!

So yes, car for six and a half hours. Lots of CD listening to do. ttfn.

Kate Bornstein’s latest book, A Queer and Pleasant Danger, is out today.

I met Kate in… 2008?, when she spoke at St. Mary’s College of Maryland, where I went for undergrad. She’s one of the most incredible people I’ve ever encountered. I hope you’ll let her inspire you, too.

This is her blog, by the way:

http://katebornstein.typepad.com/

I stand corrected! (Things I don’t learn about until two years after finishing undergrad. Apparently there are awesome indie bookstores even in deepest-darkest-western-shore-southern-Maryland!)

That said, not all communities and areas are this lucky.

#St. Mary’s College of Maryland #SMCM

yellowdecorations:

“It feels more like I’m going on vacation than going to school.”

Dude, even when you were in a dorm that’s how it is.

Yeah, this is where I went for undergrad. Yeah, I miss it.