First Kalamazoo Promise student graduates

By David Alexander

Western Herald
The first Kalamazoo Promise graduate says nobody wants to know what her dream job is.

“My dream job is to be a stay-at-home mom, and have a giant organic garden in my backyard, and be able to supply my family with all their food,” said Stacy Westhoff, a recent WMU alumna.

Westhoff graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy and professional applied ethics in December 2009. She is the first of the over 300 Kalamazoo Public School students who received money from the Kalamazoo Promise back in 2006 to do so, according to Kalamazoo Promise Executive Administrator Bob Jorth.

The Kalamazoo Promise is a scholarship, announced in 2006, that pays the tuition for KPS graduates to attend Michigan public schools.

The amount of tuition paid for depends on how long the student attended KPS – 100 percent if the student has been enrolled since Kindergarten, and up to 65 percent if the student has been enrolled since ninth grade.

The Promise was the gift of anonymous donors.

A Kalamazoo Central graduate, Westhoff said the Kalamazoo Promise money she received provided 95 percent of her college tuition while a WMU Dean’s Scholarship and Michigan Merit Award took care of the rest.

Although she said that she enjoys writing and may still opt to pursue a graduate degree, Westhoff said she isn’t presently looking for work or planning to continue her education.

“I’m kind of over school for the time being,” she said.

Westhoff said she is currently working as a nanny and waiting to look for a job until her fiancé — whom she is set to marry in May — graduates from ITT Technical Institute in April with his degree in computer drafting and design.

Although The Promise made things financially easier on Westhoff and her parents, it in no way acted as an incentive for her to attend college, she said.

When she was born, her mother applied for Michigan Educational Trust (MET) — a pre-paid tuition program parents apply for when a child is born — which would have covered most of her tuition anyway, Westhoff said.

“The plans were in place… I had planned on going to college and it [The Kalamazoo Promise] just made it that much easier… I was always going to go to Western. I didn’t apply anywhere else,” she said.

She concedes that her original major, environmental studies, would have complimented her dream of having an organic garden better, but said she settled on philosophy in the interest of finishing college sooner.

And finish soon she did – in roughly three and half years.

The Kalamazoo Promise paid out $3.4 million this fall semester to over 1,000 students, Jorth said.

In response to rumors of the Kalamazoo Promise coming to an end, Jorth said, “that is absolutely not true… The Kalamazoo Promise is set to go on forever. On the Web site it says, ‘into perpetuity.’”

Short URL: http://www.westernherald.com/?p=13975

Posted by heraldstaff on Jan 24 2010. Filed under Campus, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry

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