What the Doctor said

Everyone loves getting an “thatta boy” or in my case, girl.  This is the letter my professor sent on my behalf for a scholarship in professional writing.  I don’t know how much the scholarship is for but any amount is helpful in paying tuition!

~P.

Dr. Travis Kurowski
441 Country Club Rd.
York, PA 17403

April 19, 2011

 To Whom It May Concern,

I am writing to recommend Patricia Crider for the 2011 Carraway Scholarship.

Patricia has been more than a pleasure to have in both my Introduction to Creative Writing course this semester and as an interested, enthusiastic writer and learner on campus, who seems to be constantly working on one writing project or another. Patricia has even taken some of her student projects and began publishing online, and so doing what we hope all of our students will eventually do: taking her classroom work and testing it out in the larger world. What makes Patricia a nice addition to the creative writing classroom, is her constant, often quite insightful, commentary on her peers work.

Perhaps more to the point of this scholarship, Patricia is a motivated, intelligent writer—meaning that she is a constant reviser, always open to suggestion and critique. Many beginning writers—in an effort to perhaps prove their talent to themselves, their peers, or maybe even their professors—often have trouble taking to heart criticism and really applying it to the betterment of their writing. In my experience in the classroom, and at our writer-in-residence workshop this past month, Patricia has taken criticism from other writers and applied it to the betterment of her work—such as the use of specific, concrete images (and the right ones at that) to tell her story, allowing us to more fully imagine her world, which is what we want from our writers in the end.

Sincerely,

Dr. Travis Kurowski

Rush PA the paperwork….sit and wait, then SURPRISE!!

Hello Pennsylvania….a commonwealth…good ole PA. Really, all the paperwork I fill out for you? The forms, receipts, copies..in triplicate!
You have my social security number, issued my driver’s license, approved my name changed prior to a final divorce decree. I report my earnings, my child support, alimony, where I live, how much we eat.
Sweet Commonwealth, I have such trust in you. I rush the forms and receipts you need to process my tuition funds. Not once, but twice. The second copy of the receipt for college books needed in the next term marked “Please Rush” in desperation of check delivery.

Mail, on the kitchen table….from PA!! For me, my fundage for school books problemo. Tearing open the envelope, impressed at the speed of my new caseworker response. This dude is like my 5 caseworker. Why shuffle us around like cards? I hate retelling a new social worker all the BS on how I got in this perdicament…. Thinking as I tear, “how long will this take? how will I handle any differences in the funds?”
I stop breathing. Ok, actually was holding my breath. I see at the top of the paper one simple black checkmark. In a little box, as usual for the government’s forms. Denied. What?! DENIED?! I have professors lending me books until my funds come in! What state employee dropped the ball this time?

PA, at times a generous commonwealth, assists me in going to college. Wonderful…almost a full scholarship for my associates degree. I am blessed.
Unfortunatly I am cursed by the PA Assistance Program. Each department in PA appears to run independantly. Very little communication between state worker’s in Labor & Industry, Welfare, Domestics, etc. One department approves a scholarship, another childcare assistance. Food stamps here but child support and alimony over there. Special allowance for mileage in my Commonwealth purchased vehicle so I can drive my daughter to daycare, pick her up when it’s my custody time, buy groceries to feed my family on their tab. Special allowance for a MathLab CD….but when the serious tab (about $400 for this term) is documented and delivered twice…DENIED. Sigh…appeal.