BY FANTASIA
Exhausted with too much work
Certainly underpaid
Laboring 30 hours a week
While maintaining good grades
Occupied days
Restless nights
Trying to meet length requirements
But not knowing what to write
Lazy meals
Disbursing money wisely
Unable to spend lavishly
When textbooks are pricey
Tired of seeing paper
Fed up with gripping pencils
Pulling these all-nighters
Makes coffee essential
Though I have a few friends
I’m missing my family bad
But I’ll smile in everyone’s faces
So I won’t seem as sad
Sometimes I want to cry
When I think of crippling debt,
….how I miss my mothers cooking,
…Or how I almost failed that test
For a while my impression of college
Was difficult to convey
But now I’m content with knowing
This schoolgirl hustle will pay off one day
(photo: Forbes.com)
Fantasia Alston is a 22 year old free spirit and visionary who spends most of her time writing poetry, reading (preferably mystery books), and doing whatever she can to help better the community. Whether it be volunteering at the nearest homeless shelter or picking up any litter found on the solid surface of the Earth. She also enjoys painting whatever comes to mind, cooking, meditating, and taking long walks to nowhere. She currently resides in Columbia, SC, but grew up 3 hours away in a beautiful, yet small, city named Murrells Inlet. She is the second oldest of 8 children, and the eldest daughter. Being the matriarch of the family was tough on her, but she managed to stay strong for her younger siblings and remained focused to complete school. Although she graduated high school with an outstanding GPA, and always had a passion for attaining knowledge, Fantasia continuously put college on the back burner. She was lost and didn’t want to push herself into a mainstream culture where you have to graduate from high school by 18, graduate from college by 22, start working full-time in the corporate world immediately, and then get married, buy the proverbial house with the white picket fence and have kids. That might’ve been a great idea for her fellow classmates, but not her. After years of soul searching and finding out what career would bring her the most joy in life, she has decided that earning her degree would be best. She now has plans to attend a university and work towards becoming a child psychotherapist.
KIARA LEE is the founder of #SCHOOLGIRLHUSTLE. She’s from Richmond, Virginia and she’s passionate about education and social justice. Two of her research interests are colorism and parental incarceration. In fact, she’s been featured on CNN’s Black in America for her work with children and colorism. She’s a writer before anything else, with a blog (theBlackertheBerry.org) and 2 children’s books surrounding social issues. She often says “education can be the best thing and the worst thing at the same time,” referring to the many layers of education that can make or break a student — particularly young girls. She has a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from the University of Richmond and a master’s degree in education from the University of Virginia. She’s currently working on her PhD in education at Virginia Commonwealth University — she’s an aspiring college professor. In her free time, she likes to dabble in spoken word, write and vent about the wrongs of the world on her blog, 
#SCHOOLGIRLHUSTLE 