“This was my last chance.” The final package was here. She had applied to eight schools and received seven financial aid packages, but still couldn’t afford any of them. Five months later, the eighth showed up. It contained the information that could either make or break her hopes of going to her dream school. She was already prepared to be disappointed and to have to settle in applying to cheaper colleges if this package didn’t offer enough in scholarships. Nervous fingers opened the package. “It was huge, with a whole bunch of scholarships, and it all seemed unreal.” She started crying and knew it was fate, that she was supposed to go to that college.
Logan Nevonen, a former Rider student who currently attends St. Mary’s college, realized that, with help from ASP (Academic Success Program), she would be able to achieve her dreams.
She first learned about the program in junior high and began to meet with ASP sponsor Ms. Jaclyn Muensterman for aid in preparing for college. She knew she would need all the help she could get, because inside she carried high expectations for her future.
Nevonen had faced her fair share of struggles early on in life. She battled with dyslexia and dysgraphia from the time she was diagnosed in second grade until junior high. The experience motivated her to want to give back to others in tough situations.
“In high school, I tutored kids that also had dyslexia and dysgraphia,” Nevonen said. “It was a way that I was able to help them.”
But she didn’t stop there. Nevonen also presented a documentary presentation in the Rider auditorium to raise awareness for Invisible Children and the war in Uganda. She raised money, and led a caravan to Dallas with a friend for the cause.
“There are lots of injustices in the world that make me very passionate to step up and make a difference,” Nevonen said. “I’m going to become a human rights activist, and my dream goal is to become a member of the United Nations Human Rights Council.”
With these goals in mind, Nevonen worked with Muensterman to find colleges that not only offered classes for her major, but also best fit her beliefs.
“St. Mary’s offers the liberal arts education I wanted, but the main reason I wanted to go there was because of their mission statement: empowering women to make a difference in the world after graduation,” Nevonen said. “Their classes are based around that idea.”
However one obstacle stood in her way: the price for her education. From her freshman year at Old High to her senior year at Rider, Nevonen studied hard each day and attended multiple workshops to improve her SAT scores hoping to receive scholarships.
“Both [Muensterman and the ASP counselor at Old High] stressed the importance of studying and pushed me when I didn’t want to do it,” Nevonen said. “They kept telling me, ‘Even if you don’t want to, it’s going to get you successful one day.’”
Nevonen credits Ms. Muensterman and ASP with teaching her the essential elements that got her in the position she is now, from showing her how to prepare her application to how and what to study for the SAT, and says she wouldn’t have received her academic scholarships without the program.
“ASP helped prepare me,” Nevonen said. “If I didn’t get a lot of help from them, I wouldn’t have this opportunity.”
With the opening of that financial aid package, all of the hard work paid off and Nevonen took one step closer to achieving her dreams.