Pictured Above: Catherine Hicks was determined to be a typical college student. But then she and her fiance got a telephone call. Now the senior communications major is the foster mom of three little boys.
Patrick Tobin | The Crow’s Nest
By Catherine Hicks
To anyone who runs into me on campus, I must look like everyone else: a “typical” college student rushing late to class, my backpack overflowing with books, a laptop, two old Starbucks receipts and maybe a loose protein bar wrapper, looking down at my cellphone every couple of minutes.
Like most seniors, I often have bags under my eyes, no makeup, my hair held together by dry shampoo.
I’m late to many of my first morning classes and absent more often than other students.
I must appear fixated on my phone, checking it every five minutes for notifications. I’ve never been particularly engaged in clubs or organizations on campus – or attended many events.
I may appear self-absorbed, unambitious and scatter-brained.
There’s a reason for my tardiness and distracted nature. Just over a year ago, in May of 2019, the Florida Department of Children and Families placed my three nephews in the custody of me and my fiancé.
Just 19, I suddenly became mother figure to three boys — 3, 5 and 7 — and my fiance, Jacob Clark, a 23-year-old plumber, became their father figure.
Following a turbulent and traumatic childhood, I was determined to have a “typical” college student experience when I started at USF St. Petersburg: join the clubs that sounded interesting, make tons of friends, attend a few parties, and get some articles published in The Crow’s Nest. I even dreamed of working there one day.
But as usual, life had other plans.
In my first semester, I was forced to get a restraining order against my mother and move out on my own. My fiancé, then boyfriend, who I’d met through my adoptive father’s volunteering in the Big Brother program 11 years prior, remained my steadfast supporter through it all: attending court appearances, helping me search for apartments and jobs and enduring verbal and legal barbs from unapproving friends and family.
The following semester, when my fiancé and I received the call that our nephews needed us, there was no hesitation.
Just like that, my “typical” college student and dream college experience disappeared. Instead, my life was taken over by visits from DCF every three weeks, doctor and dentist appointments for three boys who’d never been to either in their lives, unexpected court appearances and supervising video calls and visits between the boys and their parents.
My normal shifted to include healthy meal planning (because let’s be real, I hadn’t eaten a salad in at least four years), noticing Batman, Paw Patrol and LEGO toys when I walk through Walmart, goodnight hugs and kisses, and the constant sound of “who lives in a pineapple under the sea?” – followed by a chorus of screaming “SPONGEBOB SQUAREPANTS!”
At school, I felt isolated. I realized I had less in common with the people around me. I gave up on my dream of college being “the best years in my life.”
I abandoned the ideal of being a “typical” college student.
Then professor Janet Keeler told my beginning reporting class that The Crow’s Nest had won awards for its coverage on consolidation, reminded us that the paper was looking for contributors, and introduced a staff reporter, Savannah Carr, to share what it’s like to work there.
Listening to Keeler and Carr share the importance of working for The Crow’s Nest, I suddenly remembered the dreams I’d walked into my first journalism class with dreams I’d been forced to put on hold.
At the end of the presentation, I stopped Carr and asked how I could apply for the open positions. I decided to step out of my comfort zone – to abandon the idea that I couldn’t do it because I wasn’t a “typical” college student, living at home or on campus, with a mother and father, no children, only a part-time job, if that.
My gamble paid off when a few months later, the new editor-in-chief, Sophie Ojdanic, offered me the position of news editor for the 2020-21 school year.
The Crow’s Nest team spent the summer working: learning how to function as a team, sharpening our Associated Press style skills, familiarizing ourselves with sources and records requests, interviewing and publishing articles.
Searching for sources and interviewing them for articles, I spoke to more students than I had in my entire time at USF St. Petersburg. We spoke about important subjects such as mental illness, sexual assault, canceled graduation ceremonies and financial instability caused by COVID-19.
Through those interviews, I realized one thing all students have in common: We are resilient. Every single one had something outside of college (which is stressful and difficult enough on its own) that was a tremendous responsibility – whether it was children, a sick family member, or a full-time job to make ends meet. I didn’t interview a single person who fit my perception of a “typical” college student.
As I enter my senior year as the news editor at The Crow’s Nest and mother/aunt to three amazing boys, I’ve realized I can release my expectations of what a “typical” college student and college experience should look like, and instead enjoy it for what it truly is: a journey to discover ourselves.
As one of the people I interviewed said, “There are more people like us on campus… survivors.”
