I come to Brooklyn to attend Pratt for my sophomore year of college. The campus is even more beautiful than when I visited for that month in the summer before my senior year of high school.
I recall, after that program, I had gotten in a fight with my mom about the cost of going to Pratt. I remember screaming “I don’t care what it costs” I wanted to go to art school.
Summer 2007, I work a “real” job and find that I am learning more there than I in school. The campus recently went through a multi-million dollar beautification, yet the fine art studios are dilapidated and cramped. Next to the dorm where my friends live there is the footprint of a huge administration building waiting to be built.
Around the construction site a temporary wall. A white wall next to a fine art dorm full of students paying tens of thousands of dollars for the privilege.
And yet the wall stood blank.
A beautiful opportunity wasted. A beautiful campus and administration building to get the students in and extract money from them. Put them in 20 years of debt.
It wasn’t for me.
So I decided to drop out. I went to my councilor and told him as much. He said to me “Drew, you’ve already paid, might as well finish out the semester”.
I finished but on my own terms. I went to the classes I wanted to and did the homework I felt inspired to do. Then at the end of the semester I did my own final project.
Leave a Reply