Marina Misic, SUNY Purchase

I am a political science major, and after graduation, I look to pursue higher education whether that be a graduate degree or a degree in law. Within my career, I would like to do something revolving around human rights advocacy. I am lucky enough that the Excelsior scholarship as well as a few others helped me receive an education tuition free. I have worked in the retail sector for over 2 years now and I work from 20-40+ hours a week depending on the time of the year and my availability. I have received funds from TAP, I would just like to make it accessible for more students and to cover more of the expenses. My biggest challenge when paying for college was paying the full cost of the tuition outright for my first semester, with the scholarships I was supposed to receive only giving me a refund at the end of the semester. As a commuter, I live at home with my single mother and we both work to pay our rent and afford all of our necessities. Recently the used car I had paid in full, broke down in the middle of the road and it was not salvageable. To make sure I had a reliable means of transportation to school and work, I had to get another used car from a dealership and I now have an additional 230 dollar monthly expense for 6 years. I have dealt with the problem of not having enough class options. Attending a school where the conservatories are the most funded, as a political science major, our program only has 2 full-time faculty, one of whom had taken the spring semester off for a sabbatical. As a result of this, the professors are very limited in what they can teach and none of the classes that were listed in my requirements for U.S. Politics and Law Courses were offered and my professor even brought up her concerns regarding this.The overall lack of accessibility for disabled people regarding the issues with the elevator in the humanities building and various other dormitories are big issues on campus. Another issue I had was that I was walking to class on a cold day and I did not realize that there was ice because my path was not closed off and was covered in snow. The ice caused me to trip and hurt my ankle pretty badly, and after 3 weeks I still have pain in my joint because of it. I really would want a more accessible and better-maintained campus to avoid any other injuries.