I got my dream 2yr Scholarship for Masters in USA

My name is Viviana. After an enormous amount of effort (and some hardships; more on that below), I have secured a prized place and full-ride scholarship to complete a Masters in Latin American Studies at an R1 University in the USA, where I will start my research project on the intersections of poverty, precarity, class politics, and educational opportunities and outcomes in Colombia. Now I am trying to raise money to help me travel from Colombia to the USA to start my studies.

I am the daughter of a peasant family from the Boyacá region of Colombia, who, as a consequence of poverty, were displaced to the city of Bogotá in the 1970s. My grandparents never went to school and my parents left school at 10 years old (in the fourth grade). I am the first person in my family to have access to a University education. And, over the last 7 years, I managed to build a career as a policy specialist on social projects that aim to reduce poverty and improve social mobility among the most disadvantaged citizens of my country. I now hope to grow professionally and develop ambitious educational and social initiatives that allow the social mobilization of more young people in Colombia. To do this, I need to pursue a postgraduate research degree. However, as someone from a low-income socio-economic background, I have faced enormous battles and barriers to continue my education (more on that below), and now that I have managed to come this far, I need to ask for a little help to pay for the costs of moving to the USA to start the Masters degree.

THE AIM OF THIS GO FUND ME CAMPAIGN: Over the last four years, I have met many friends near and far who have shown great solidarity with my journey, lending me their advice, guidance, and enthusiasm to help me keep believing in myself and keep going even when encountering staggering barriers. Now, I need to ask you for one last bit of help, a small contribution to help me cover the immense costs of moving and starting my degree. With the savings that I accrued from my current job and from the Spanish classes I was able to teach online, I was able to pay for the many University application fees, the cost of applying for student visas, legal fees, and the cost of my living expenses in Bogota until now, but I need some help to cover the costs of my move to the United States. I am looking to raise up to $5,000 over the next two weeks to help pay for the costs of moving to the USA to start my journey as a graduate student, which include: 1) Airfare $600, 2) Segregated fees at University, $750, 3) Accommodation & Sustenance for 6 weeks after arrival, before I receive my first paycheck from the University (Oct), $3350, 4) Books and other study materials: $300.

THE CONTEXT - FOUR YEARS OF BARRIERS, A DREAM DELAYED: For those of us who have grown up in disadvantaged or poverty contexts, education and access to knowledge is an absolute privilege, but access to education is often a lifelong battle. Although, I now have a scholarship with full funding to pursue a graduate degree in the Unites States, I have faced four long and arduous years of heartbreaking barriers.

Aware of the importance of quality academic education, four years ago, in 2018, I decided to apply to postgraduate degrees and scholarships in Colombia and abroad. First of all, I faced the language barrier. In Colombia, bilingual education was exclusive to private schools, so I needed to learn English from the most basic level, and since I did not have the funds to study, I was forced to apply for an expensive loan from the bank in order to enroll in a formal class. In 2018, I also applied for a scholarship for postgraduate study in the USA. I was offered a place on a two-year Masters degree with full funding at a prestigious R-1 University in the USA. This was a moment of immense pride for me, as no one in my family or community had ever imagined that it was possible to study abroad or to obtain a full-ride scholarship. However, this dream was lost because in 2019, the US Embassy refused my application for a student visa. I lost the chance to travel to the USA to take up the scholarship. I was devastated at losing the opportunity to travel, and the following year, I became unemployed as a result of the Covid pandemic.

Nonetheless, I still tried to pursue my dream and I started teaching Spanish online while I searched for relevant policy employment in Bogota. I also applied for scholarships to study in other countries. This is how I learned about the Chevening scholarship offered by the United Kingdom government to study a one-year Masters degree in England. By myself, I prepared essays describing my leadership characteristics and ambitions. As the Chevening programe is very competitive and receives over 65,000 applications per year from aspiring candidates from all over the world for just 1650 places, I did not expect that I would be selected for an interview. Nonetheless, I was invited to an interview and with my then broken English I tried to convey to the committee my enthusiasm and potential. To my surprise, I was selected as a reserve candidate for the scholarship that year, (2020) which gave me the motivation to try again.

The following year, I re-applied to Chevening, and I was awarded the Chevening scholarship (summer 2021). This was another dream come true. However, I was unable to take up the scholarship because the University in the United Kingdom would not allow me to take up the place without a particular English language exam score (IELTS). It didn’t matter to this University that I came from a low-income background and could not afford formal exam training, nor that the cost of the IELTS exam in my country was the equivalent to one-third of my monthly salary in Colombia, and therefore it was unfeasible to retake the exam time and time again. After much heartbreak, I had to give up the Chevening scholarship in 2021. By this time, I had spent hundreds of dollars a year on application fees to Universities in the UK, USA, and Europe, on IELTS exams, and on lawyers’ fees. And, I was exhausted and demoralized by all of the barriers that I was encountering, year after year.

I decided to try one last time in autumn 2021, and I reapplied for the Chevening scholarship for a Masters degree in the United Kingdom and I also applied for half a dozen fully funded Masters degrees in the United States. In summer 2022, I was awarded a Chevening for a second time, and I was also awarded a two-year funding package to complete a two year Masters degree in Latin American Studies at a University in the USA. Last week, after a great deal of preparation, I had an interview for a student visa at the US embassy in Bogota, and I was granted a visa to travel to the USA to undertake the Masters degree. I have decided to pursue the Master's program in Latin American and Caribbean Studies at this institution because of the university's research trajectory on poverty issues and the academic quality of the program, and because two years will allow me the important time to develop my skills and proficiency in academic writing and develop a robust research project that addresses inequality in Colombia.

THANK YOU & GETTING IN TOUCH:

I have asked my good friend Chloe, who lives in London, to organize the Go Fundme, because I cannot organize the campaign from Colombia. She will transfer the funds to me via Western Union in Colombia or the United States. If you would like to speak to either of us, please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Thank you for reading and for your support.

Viviana