One Ohio Student's Recession Journey

When he was 19, Jeremy VanMeter thought getting straight A's in high school guaranteed him a college education.

He was wrong.


Last year, his junior year at Muskingum University, a small, Appalachian Ohio college, the government cut his financial aid by $10,000, forcing Jeremy to quit school and get a job.

Today he is back in college, but a year in the workforce taught him how much there is to learn outside the classroom, and why no one should take school for granted. Here is his story:

Jeremy was angry -- angry at having to drive a fork lift every day, angry that he wasn't where he really wanted to be: in school. He remembers the day this past summer when he decided to quit.

"I left work, irritated by the entire past year," he said. "And beyond that, I was very negative, because I thought for some reason I deserved better, that I had worked my ass off my entire high school career banking on the fact that my academic excellence would help me get a full ride in college, not get me an hourly job pushing pallets into trucks."

So the 21-year-old drove that mile, parked in the commuter lot, walked into Montgomery Hall past several administrative offices and tapped on the vice president for enrollment's office door to ask for a few minutes of his time. The man obliged. After Jeremy laid out his story and extenuating circumstances, he said he could help.

About four weeks into the fall 2008 semester of his junior year, VanMeter left Muskingum University. He didn't leave by choice; he was forced to due to changes in his financial aid. "My leave had nothing to do with grades; I was getting A's in all my classes," he explained. He pressed that he wanted to come back to school.

"In total, I lost qualification for around $10,000 that year, which was previously awarded based on need," he said. "The federal Pell Grant was the biggest hit, which accounted for almost half of that loss." He tried to take out loans to compensate for the gap, but the ones he qualified for still left him short. When he didn't come up with the money, he left campus.

"What I learned was this: federal guidelines are not generous to people who claim to be 'independent,'" he said. "Last year, you could say that I was a person who 'fell through the cracks' . . . Most of all, I felt personally defeated. I was angry too."

He never felt like he was better than anyone else, he pointed out. "Everyone struggles to get to where they are and make it through life. I guess this feeling I had was disappointment because my high school teachers encouraged me to study hard and focus on academic excellence, and that because of this I could go far in college." He quickly discovered that wasn't the case. Money plays a big role too.

Jeremy insists his story is not unique. "There are thousands, probably tens of thousands more who have a similar story as mine," he said. "The system is not set up to make sure all people succeed. Likewise, education is not a fundamental right in this country. It is a privilege. I believe my strongest advocate during this process was God. Looking back, I think last year's ordeal was further evidence to me that every person has a purpose in life."

Despite his absence from school, his political education continued outside the classroom. With a resume already peppered with political experience, he used his time off to open a chapter of Young Democrats in Fairfield County as well as a Democratic headquarters for the 2008 campaigns which is still open today. He also got a job as a forklift operator at NFI Industries in New Concord, Ohio. But Jeremy spent the majority of his hiatus continuing his work as a member of the Berne Union Board of Education.

A Budding Local Politician

Jeremy's first interaction with the board was as a high school senior and school newspaper editor. He attended his first meeting at which the contract his English teacher, also the newspaper's adviser, was not going to be renewed. Jeremy was the first to address the board that day in opposition to her non-renewal. Despite his protest, the board voted to non-renew 4-1.

As editor of the paper, Jeremy made several requests for documentation showing why her contract was non-renewed. Eventually he was called into the principal's office and told to back off with the requests "because nothing was going to happen with them." He relented. At the end of that year he spoke out against the board's decision in his valedictory address at graduation.

"We were the class that continued to ask why the board fired one of the best educators ever to be employed by the district," he said to a crowd that responded with a standing ovation.

From then on, he attended every board meeting that he could. The following year he ran for a seat, eventually edging out the incumbent board president.

"I ran for a seat on the board because I had a unique perspective that the board lacked; I ran against no one individual," he said. "I knocked on doors and engaged people in my community."

During his time away from school, he dedicated more time to the board and becoming a better board member, taking advantage of many professional development opportunities and workshops through the Ohio School Boards Association.

"The baby boomers have substantial clout in everything we do in the U.S. They have the largest lobbying ability (AARP), they are draining the Social Security system, and worst of all, they are failing to recruit and mentor younger people to be the next public servants. The conundrum that exists is that the young politicos do not really want to be 'fathered' or mentored. We like to think we have everything already figured out." Jeremy admits he is generalizing, and says he has encountered people with truly genuine beliefs on youth involvement. Most of these observations he made as he became more involved with the Fairfield County Democratic Party, which he says is growing old, mostly older than 65. "There are very few young people active within the party," he said. "If things continue as is, very few people will be groomed to fill their shoes. It concerns me because I believe that for our democratic tendencies to endure, we must have broad participation by all ages, not just those retired and over 65."

"I think it's hard for young people to fit in because we were not around when Kennedy ran for president as most all of them were," he said of his fellow county party supporters. "Their stories are not our stories. We read about their stories in our history books. Our technologies are not their technologies."

His concern is that few will be groomed in time to fill the shoes of the older leaders in society. Because of the age disparity, Jeremy says he has noticed that the young people who are involved do not seek the advice of older leaders or form close ties or bonds with them. He does, because he believes that there is much to learn. He attends their luaus and fundraisers and formal executive meetings. "I'm always the youngest person in the crowd," he said. "The second youngest person at these events is probably age 40 and then age 65."

"My observation is simply this: I think our generation likes to believe we have politics all figured out. We are ready for the older ones to step aside. The older ones are not ready to step aside."

When a person is young and running for office or taking office, he or she should be prepared to be lectured by colleagues on "how things work around here," Jeremy explained. Youth are perceived as a threat to the status quo, the way things have always been done, and youth are perceived as a threat to the tradition and the undoing of things that took years of hard work to accomplish, he continued.

"I think our generation is also more accepting of different kinds of people and more sensitive to social issues."

One situation clearly emphasizes his point. As a sitting member of the district's board, VanMeter participated in the selection of a new superintendent after the former retired. The board hired a consultant to help them in their search. Weeks before the arrival of the consultant, during a work session in which no one from the public was involved, the board and the outgoing superintendent and treasurer worked to prepare questions for candidates. VanMeter heard a comment that made him cringe:

"Well, now just to warn you all, the consultant is black" (his emphasis).

Others laughed off the comment, VanMeter recalls, but it left a bad taste in his mouth. "Being a new board member, I kind of shrunk into my seat," he said. "I was embarrassed by what this person said, but not a single other person in the room seemed to blink by the comment. I did not speak up about it as I probably should have. I let the comment fester over the next few months."

As an Asian-American, Jeremy began to wonder what was being said behind his back. "I wondered to myself -- having been newly elected -- if this same individual was telling other people, 'yea, one of our board members is Chinese.'" (Jeremy is actually part Filipino, "but people in the area I live in seem to generalize all people with Asian heritage as coming from China.")

About four months later, during a heated argument on trust, Jeremy couldn't hold it in any longer. In executive session, Jeremy charged the board member with the inappropriateness of the previous comment. "I would have told you the person was black, and furthermore I would tell you if the person was a woman," Jeremy recalls the person saying in response.

The comment added insult to injury.

"I was totally shell-shocked," he said. "I looked around the room and for the most part the people there looked at me as though I was in the wrong. I was just in total disbelief of what I had just heard and the reaction of some of these people who I considered colleagues. I told the person the next time we have a consultant come to talk to us, to warn them that the people on our board are all white males, because apparently it matters."

Jeremy believes his observance of situations like this can spur growth as a citizen and, possibly, a politician. "I constantly wonder how I will perceive young people when I am 'old,' if I am still serving in an elected capacity twenty years from now or beyond," he said. "I think just from my short experience, I have learned that the next generation is always going to be smarter and more creative than the previous. So, with that in mind, I hope I retain that perception as I grow older."

Voters seem to like the fact that young people are expressing interest in running for office, he said. It's an unusual phenomenon. "It's good to get some 'new blood' in there. Maybe you can change things," Jeremy recalls being told often.

"To me, these comments add further proof that change takes considerable time," he said. "I think it is the people in office, who are older and 'more experienced' that take issue, not so much voters. It is better to start young, but not necessarily the prerequisite."

It might be difficult, but a young perspective in politics is an advantage, he said.

Back Amongst His Peers

Jeremy has returned to Muskingum this semester, finally able to focus on his own formal education again. Despite having previously been told that he could only register as an "independent" on the FAFSA if he was age 24, a veteran, or married, the vice president of enrollment told him that because of his unique circumstances regarding his relationship with his parents, he would qualify. Being an independent allowed him to avoid reporting his parents income on the FAFSA, and being granted a dependency override. It was a long process, but the outcome, he says, was worth it.

The feelings of anger are gone now. Going to college is a privilege, Jeremy acknowledges. He walks down the halls smiling, stopping to speak with old friends who seem very excited to have him back on campus. But his concerns remain with the students he continues to help oversee in Fairfield County. He knows all too well what troubles might lie ahead for them.

"The realization was that for me, 'going far' was dependent not upon how smart I was or how hard I studied but whether or not I could show [the university] the money," he said.

Jeremy says this perspective is what helped him become so passionate about public education. "Our K-12 system affords every child, no matter if his or her parents are rich or poor or in the middle, an equal opportunity to learn, grow, feel valued and experience success."

His education continues both inside and outside the classroom, and the experiences, both good and bad, equally provide a means to evolve from being just another kid to becoming a seasoned political professional.

"At every turn I met these ordinary people," he said of his time away from school, "and every person I met had something extraordinary to teach me."


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