“Schools out, schools out; teachers let the monkeys out…” You can hear school children all over the world singing those lyrics with enthusiasm, especially on the last day of school; but for some high school seniors, like me; that emotional day incorporated a lingering sense of fear, sadness and uncertainty. My dreams of going to college with my friends had been dashed due to a lack of finances, encouragement, and information; leaving me to start a life for myself with only a high school diploma. I came from a family of hard-working coal miners and/or preachers; none of whom were well educated nor excessively paid. In the early 1960s, at the age of 16, my father dropped out of high school to go to work in an open pit mine where he studied to be a heavy mechanic. (An open pit mine is where coal is pulled from the surface of the ground after the earth has been stripped of trees and soil. A heavy mechanic works on the large equipment that strips the earth and extracts the coal.) A couple of years later he married my mother who subsequently dropped out of school; and in a short time they became the parents of four lively children, of whom I was the eldest. We were considered an average middle class family in our small mountain town where my father worked 40-75 hours a week providing for our family while our mother took care of us and our home. We always had everything we needed and never lacked anything essential...until it was time for college. I was an honor student, most of the time, and dreamed of going to college after high school. Unbeknownst to my parents, I even visited the college I wanted to go to and applied, despite knowing they couldn't pay me to go; and above all there, just an hour away but outside... middle of paper... barrier. In a time when computers were just coming onto the scene and information wasn't as readily available, I didn't have the wisdom to know how to dig deeper and investigate further on my own. Consequentially; My lack of information left me unaware of the financial aid opportunities I could apply for and possibly receive. My parents were partly right, the hard work and experience paid off; I spent 13 of my 15 years in the food industry as an executive and was paid well; however, the lack of further education due to financial, informational and encouragement barriers has resulted in some missed opportunities along the way. However, nearly thirty years later I have overcome those barriers and my dream of going to college has been revived. I will graduate…. just in time to send our eldest to college with all the information and support she will need.