I was fourteen when I
made the decision to join the inaugural class of the Advance College Academy
and I can’t help but look back at that little girl and thank her for not doing
what was easy, but what was best for her future. It would have been easy for me
to continue with the International Baccalaureate Program, but I was intrigued
by the opportunities this new program offered me. It seemed far-fetched, even
impossible, that I could get a college degree while I was in high school and go
into my four-year university as a junior.
A few years later, I remember my first real college classes, and wondering what
in the world I had gotten myself into. But in retrospect, I was gaining such a
valuable edge over other high school students. When I started my first year at
the University of Mary Washington, my peers did not see the value in actually reading
the assignments for class and had not learned how to write for college classes.
What I had struggled through in high school I watched my new classmates
struggle through in college, where other pressures and stresses were so much
greater than in the safety of Tucker High School.Every single credit I took through Reynolds Community College in the ACA program transferred to Mary Washington and counted toward my major and toward my general education requirements, allowing me to graduate this coming May. While it is bittersweet, graduating before everyone else my age, I am so much closer to accomplishing my goals than I would have been without this program. I have been accepted into the Richmond Law Class of 2020 and will begin a new journey there this fall. Also, as an Economics Major, I have a fuller appreciation for the financial benefit of cutting my undergraduate student debt in half.
The time and fiscal benefits of this program are easy to see. But I place so much more value on the skills I gained by being pushed toward excellence by our mentors and teachers. They instilled in me a drive to do my best work, a willingness to be the best I could be, and the overwhelming desire to make them proud of me. I hope that so far I have.
Jordan transferred 60 college credits from the Reynolds ACA to UMW and graduated in May with a B.S. in Economics, after only two years at UMW. Jordan is starting law school in Fall 2017 at the University of Richmond on a full academic scholarship. She is a UR cheerleader and anticipates being able to earn her law degree at the age of 23.
