Talking about privilege is really challenging – particularly when it includes a significant amount of self-reflection into one’s own privilege. It’s a difficult but worthy exercise to engage in.
Here is something I’ve been thinking about:
How I Bought My Spot at Yale
“How many colleges did you apply to?” a prospective Yale student asked me during an Environmental Studies major peer mentor info session. I paused. “I only applied to Yale,” I answered uncomfortably before I quickly changed the subject back to the structure of the major. I did not want to explain my unhindered path into Yale as a recruited track and field athlete, nor did I want to delegitimize my authority as an academic mentor by disclosing that my admissions to Yale as based on something aside from merit. While considering my privilege, I realized that it was not, in fact, my athletic ability that got me into Yale, it was my family’s money.
Growing up, I was convinced hard work yields success. I internalized the notion early on, assuming it extrapolated to everything in my life. I believed that when I walked into a classroom or on to a starting line, it was my diligence and determination that set me apartment from my peers. When I got the highest grade on a test or won a race, I assumed it was a result of my own doing and my own hard work. I did not know the system was rigged for me. I thought that I deserved to be admitted to Yale.
The college admissions process is saturated with financial privilege. In some cases, the money is far more visible and direct than in others. Recent investigations proved fabricated recruiting qualifications and bribes of hundreds of thousands of dollars to buy a spot at Yale. In scandals such as this one, we can easily follow the money. Although in a much more indirect way, my financial privilege bought me into Yale. My family’s money put me int the position to apply only to Yale and apply with the security that I would get my acceptance along with the rest of the early admissions Class of 2020.
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I went from a class of thirty-nine students in the eighth grade to a class of 800 in the ninth grade, of which over two hundred did not make it to our high school graduation. I was excited by the prospect of going to a new and big school, but I was also terrified to enter a space with no friends and no idea what I was interested in.
Prior to beginning high school, I made the decisions to quit a seven-year run as a gymnast. From age seven to age fourteen, I was in the gym five afternoon a week for at least four hours, more when I could convince my parents to let me stay late or go to open gym on Saturday morning. I squeezed in club volleyball and varsity soccer and basketball in middle school, too. My childhood and adolescence were marked by afternoons of sports, and my tenacity forced me to work hard until I excelled.
After I mentally and physically grew out of gymnastics, I decided I wanted to try track and field. My high school team was my first opportunity to do so. In California, track and field is a spring sport; cross country, however, is run in the fall. Despite having no interest or desire to run more than a few hundred meters at a time, I needed to fill my afternoons with sports and make friends at my new school. I joined the cross-country team with nerves but approached the workouts with the guts and grit I learned as a gymnast. I did not thrive, athletically, in cross country in the same way I had in other sports I had pursued, but I met my best friend and hung onto the last spot on the varsity squad.
I felt out of place without passion for the sport I was doing, but I was building friendships and fitness every afternoon at practice. I had almost forgotten about my aversion to long distance running when January came, and the team transitioned from cross country to track and field. One day after practices, our coach made us do push-ups – a difficult feat for most young female long-distance runners. Not for me. I was used to doing sets of one-hundred consecutive push-ups from my days as a gymnast. I completed the first set of twenty push-ups with ease. I sat quietly and waited for the rest of my teammates to finish. The coach and the captain of the men’s track team stared at me in surprise. They looked at each other and then back at me again, asking me to do another set. Not thinking anything of their intentions or of the difficulty of the strength exercise, I did it again.
When I showed up to practice the next day, the coach pulled me from the distance group and gave me a sprint workout to do instead. After I got through the workout, demonstrating my speed and strength, the coach and men’s captain confronted me with the idea of trying the heptathlon.
I needed absolutely no convincing to pursue this grueling two day, seven-event endeavor. It was perfect for me. It was difficult and multi-disciplinary – the qualities I had dreamed of pouring my hard work into after I stopped gymnastics. In April 2013, I completed my first heptathlon. It did not go well. I was disqualified in the hurdles and could barely hold the four-kilogram shot put in one hand. Still, my speed down the track and my determination to pursue the heptathlon provided a promising foundation for improvement. Not to mention, I absolutely loved it.
My parents, thrilled by newfound athletic journey, supported by passion and potential. They agreed that I needed additional coaching and training outside of my high school track team. So, sophomore year started, and so did my three-years of private coaching. I did not run cross country that year; instead, I devoted three afternoons a week to training with my new coach at a local college.
Josh, my coach, quit his job at UC Santa Barbara to form a professional track and field club for heptathletes and decathletes. More specifically, the club was for his former college athlete, Barbara, who placed second in the NCAA in the heptathlon, fifth at the Olympic trails in 2012, but had no post collegiate training opportunities. Josh created one for her, and she went on to win two US championships and compete in the Rio Olympics in 2016. I started training with Josh and the Santa Barbara Track Club in 2013. A track and field club, specifically more multi-event athletes, was unheard of until Josh. Coincidentally, my introduction to the heptathlon happened at the same time and exactly the right time because Josh needed money to get the club off the ground and sustain his livelihood, so he was happy to have the extra income from a private client like me.
After my first sixth months training with Josh, I improved exponentially. I established myself as a top heptathlete in the state of California and as the premier track and field athlete at my high school. It was clear that my improvements were a result of Josh’s training and expertise. At the end of tenth grade, I had won county and league championships in events across the board, I had advanced through state preliminaries and finals, and had times and marks worthy of collegiate track and field.
By the beginning of my junior year, I had the athletic and academic qualification for the elite institutions I had always dreamed of going to. I started sending emails to coaches at Ivy Leagues, Stanford, Duke, and Williams College. At that moment, I knew if I continued on my trajectory on the track and in school, I would have my pick of colleges to attend. My only responsibilities became training hard and studying hard. My parents assured me that as long as I continued to work hard and be successful, checking all the necessary recruiting boxes, they could pay for me to go to college.
Going into my senior year of high school, I had broken school and city track and field records, and I was set to take my official recruiting visits at Yale, Princeton, Duke, and Williams College. The ball was entirely in my court. I had the reverse college admissions process to most of my peers. I got to choose which school I wanted to attend, not the contrary.
As the Yale coach drove me back to the airport after my weekend visit, he said, “There’s a spot for you if you want it.” On October 1st, I submitted my early admissions application to Yale University. My grades and scores were qualified, my essays were fine, but my spot here had been secured far before I submitted the application.
I trained with my coach Josh and the Santa Barbara Track Club not because of my potential to be an Olympian, but because my parents could afford to pay the private training fee. My parents encouraged me to have extra sessions before important meets; they sent me to national competitions across the country, so I could compete against the best; they bought me the seven different shoes necessary for each event in the heptathlon; all the while they paid for my livelihood, so I could devote every afternoon to track and field instead of a part-time job. I worked really hard and was successful, so as a result, I was congratulated on my “well-deserved” spot at Yale.
My parents did not bribe the coaching staff to recruit me for a place in the Class of 2020. I had the academic qualification to be a student at the university. I had the personal bests to be an athlete on the team. Nevertheless, my financial privilege indirectly bought me in to Yale. I did work hard, but the only barriers I had to overcome were ten thirty-three-inch hurdles.
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