The Value of an Ivy League Degree

Yes, it cost me a small fortune, and no, I didn’t just get a big name. To start with, I should say that I loved Columbia. I loved it so much that I briefly considered tattooing the school’s crown insignia on my ankle when I graduated.

High school wasn’t exactly an intellectual playground. Subjects like Hand to Hand Combatives and Soul Crushing Rumors 101 may as well have been on the syllabus. When I got to Columbia, I was a kid in an intellectual candy store. For the first time, I could concentrate on great writing and great ideas. I didn’t have to worry about living out a scene from Lord of the Flies.

However, there was a Faustian bargain involved. You could take whatever you liked from this smorgasbord of thought, but the coursework was going to work your fingers raw. A savvy student once remarked that he couldn’t decide whether his relationship with the place reminded him more of Stockholm Syndrome or Battered Person Syndrome. I would agree.

But we weren’t just getting beaten into the club. (Although that was there too.) By the end of your four years at Columbia, you could parse ideas and synthesize them into written text on any time frame. Regardless of whether you use the subjects you studied at Columbia, the ability to meet a deadline is something you take wherever you go.

More than that though, I fell in love with the craft of conveying ideas through the written word. When I come to your story, I’m not an artist. I’m a craftswoman. This is all about you. I’m looking to get inside your mind and tailor my voice to yours. Some build with brick and mortar. I build with words. Let me put the value of my training to work for you.