Growing up I always knew I would attend college. My parents never put any pressure on me to get into "top" schools. Summer before junior year I went on a road-trip with my folks visiting state-school campuses in Alabama within 4 hours drive of my hometown. We visited Auburn, Montevallo and AUM. I remember the trip was very spur-of-the-moment and when we showed up to each campus we found out that because we hadn't made an advance reservation we couldn't get a campus tour. The admissions offices were polite enough to offer us some brochures, but I'm pretty sure they were laughing with their co-workers about how dumb we were for not making an appointment. We didn't even have reservations for a hotel! We just stopped at Holiday Inns along the highway until we found one with a vacancy.
Our fist stop was Auburn. As my dad and aunt had both graduated form Auburn I had visited that campus several times growing up. We went downtown and had a Toomer's Lemonade and watched students walking on campus. I listened to my dad tell stories of his days in pharmacy school studying late at night at the
Kopper Kettle before it was reduced to rubble. And how the War Eagle Supper Club had the best pizza in town.
We moved on up US Hwy 280 to visist Montevallo, but by the time we arrived in the late afternoon (in the summer) the admissions office was closed! We managed to pick up some basic brochures in the lobby and drove around the campus. I was in love with the Old Southern Charm of the campus and my mom liked that it had a much smaller enrollment than Auburn and she thought I would feel more at home there and have smaller class sized so I could do better academically. My dad said he heard it was a "suit-case" college and everyone packed up on Fridays and headed home for the weekend.
We found a hotel with a vacancy and spent the night somewhere near Selma and the next day went on to Montgomery to check out Auburn University-Montgomery. Mom had heard they had a really good program for students with disabilities (which was important as I am ADHD). She also liked that it was a smaller campus than Auburn. When we arrived at the admissions office we were informed that we couldn't get a tour that day because it was Thursday and tours were only on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. The woman in the office took pity on us and arranged a meeting with the director of the Students with Disabilities office.
When I took the ACT a few months later I selected for my scores to be sent to the schools I had visited that summer, but when it came time to apply for college there was only one place I was interested in attending... Auburn. I applied and got in and never bothered trying to get in anywhere else. As far as finances were concerned my parents had not saved for my college, but the were able to pay for most of my tuition and room and board. I did take out a Stafford loan to cover some of my tuition expenses. I borrowed a little over $17,000 and I am paying it back slowly, but surely.
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