Dear College: Recent Episodes
David Goodman, Steve Marantz
A podcast featuring high school seniors and their college admission and scholarship essays. Because what they say about themselves says a lot about all of us.
Tayana Antoine (Fenway High 2023) describes the similarities between a teen mom and an older sister. How her dual role as caretaker for her younger siblings and as a maturing adult can be both stressful and rewarding.
Jenessa Otabor (Fenway High 2023) shares how an educational opportunity turned from stressful to rewarding; once she learned how to speak up for herself.
Though Rashad Brown-Mitchell was born and raised in Boston, his essay is a tale of two cities. One is the brochure Boston, its prosperous streets lined with historical buildings. The other story reveals Boston's neighborhoods, marred by a stark inequity. In this episode, Rashad shares how the volunteering he did throughout high school wasn’t just to help his community heal, but to help himself heal as his family coped with the loss of their home. His reflections on activism are moving, grounded, and ultimately, full of hope.
Rashad's essay concludes Season 1 of Dear College. You can stay tuned for Season 2 by subscribing to the show, and following us on Facebook and Instagram.
When Catari Giglio was a junior at Boston's West Roxbury Academy, the School Department announced that they were going to close the high school. She and her classmates were told they’d have to transfer for their senior year, piling more chaos onto an already stressful time. But in the face of disappointment, Catari felt something ignite inside her: a fighting instinct. Her college essay shares how she pushed back against what she thought was an unfair decision, discovering a new passion in the process.
Fenway High senior Anthony Gonzalez (2020) wrote his college essay about "code-switching" -- alternating between two social and cultural norms -- and how he used it to navigate high school.
Salamata Barry, a Fenway High senior, writes of the trauma of undergoing Female Genital Mutilation in her native West African country of Guinea. She talks of her resolve to bring an end to the dangerous cultural custom.
Azadi Charles Sampson recounts the support group of African-American men who shaped his vision of a career in law enforcement.