But teachers noticed that Fierceton often seemed physically uncomfortable in her mother's presence, and a close friend noted that she was often injured. And youre getting instruction from a university official that thats how youre supposed to fill it out, thats what the definition says online. And Im kind of one of the lucky ones where I had really expansive and thorough documentation for all the parts of this story. Deconstructed is a production of First Look Media and The Intercept. [Laughs.]. RG: Penn didnt respond to a request for comment, but in its response to Mackenzies lawsuit, they write: Penn denies that there are accessibility problems with the Caster Building which contributed to Mackenzies medical emergency or to [Cameron] Drivers death. The kind of reporting we do is essential to democracy, but it is not easy, cheap, or profitable. At her request Penn kept her contact information out of the school's directory on its website. Fierceton told the story that, according to her diary, her mother had told her to tellthat she had tripped while playing with the family dogs and bruised herself on the corner of a nearby table. Like one of them was describing a biological child in a house as another foster child, and something about a half-brother or something.What were those and how were those errors kind of deployed against you? And again, people, including Penn administrators, have the perception of I think the stereotype and my friend Anea Moore, whos a Rhodes Scholar and graduate of Penn who founded Penn first or co-founded it had a really great quote in The New Yorker about we arent all, quote-unquote something along the lines of like impoverished, inner city kids who go to crumbling public schools as the wider media portrays us to be. This can happen to someone in my community. According to an investigation by the Chronicle of Higher Education, University of Pennsylvania student Mackenzie Fierceton lost her Rhodes scholarship and her master's degree was withheld after. The article by reporter Rachel Aviv was called How an Ivy League School Turned Against a Student, and it tells the story of an extraordinary battle between Mackenzie and the University of Pennsylvania. And because you were not just low-income, actually no income, other than the jobs that you were working nobody has complained about the low-income one, right? Smith said he believed the university had decided before it began investigating that Fierceton's abuse allegations were false and that she had fabricated them with the goal of finding an easier way into Penn or another elite school. Penn didnt respond to a request for comment, but in its response to Mackenzies lawsuit, they write: Penn denies that there are accessibility problems with the Caster Building which contributed to Mackenzies medical emergency or to [Cameron] Drivers death. Deconstructed[emailprotected]theintercept.com, Photo illustration: Soohee Cho for The Intercept; Getty Images, AP, This weeks guest on Deconstructed is Mackenzie Fierceton, who was the subject of, The Philadelphia Inquirer erroneously wrote that she had grown up poor. And I turned over all this information to his widow. [23] In mid-April, Penn released Fierceton's master's degree. Who are your biological family? I didnt encounter many of them in the two years that I was living in foster families. MF: Yeah, so Penn First for the whole FGLI community. [2], Fierceton refused, and a week before she withdrew from the Rhodes Scholarship, Penn's Office of Student Conduct (OSC) notified Fierceton it, too, would be investigating. Thats not in question. Mackenzie Fierceton grew up poor, cycling through the rocky child welfare system. [2][e], A spokesman for the D.A. If you speak, Im going to disconnect you from the call. Its, in my opinion, because they get overlooked and the kids like me are kind of rendered invisible by the privileges of our biological families. Like there is more attention to systemic poverty and trying to keep children in their homes to begin with, I would say, which is important, because if you can keep kids in their homes, then theyre not in the system and facing that foster-to-prison pipeline. Fierceton responded that that showed the university's "vulnerability and desperation". RG: Interesting. [2] Morrison's bond was originally set at $40,000, but lowered to $5,000 over prosecutors' strenuous objections. There was also the part of me that was terrified. 's office explained the decision to drop the charges against Morrison as based on new evidence that had emerged. And she had gone to a private school growing up. Its account focused on the Rhodes controversy, discussing her and Driver's suits near the end, and recalling some other recent instances of academic dishonesty, including one 2009 Harvard student whose largely fabricated high school records were only discovered when he had applied for a Rhodes Scholarship. [3], Through her attorney, Morrison gave a statement, her only one so far, on the case: "Mackenzie is deeply loved by her mom and family. Not as something that is for the benefit of the MacKenzies, the people who were being brought into the school, but actually for the benefit of the university itself, its image and also for the students. Like, those two things dont fit together. They had done their own investigation again, quotes on investigation and then I had submitted over a hundred pages of documents to them. [2] Winkelstein, who has a Ph.D. in bioengineering and has studied injuries,[3] then proceeded to interrogate Fierceton at length about her abuse and hospitalization, in a manner that led Fierceton to believe that not only did Winkelstein doubt her story but had spoken with Morrison. In addition to reiterating many of the themes of comments made by her and her supporters in the previous articles, including criticism of the Rhodes and Penn investigations (the former of which Grim noted she was putting air quotes around when she mentioned it), she expressed a belief that her story had triggered a defensive anxiety in women like Finkelstein and White:[4]. Penn's report notes that Fierceton disputes this account. And then I remembered that my teacher had told me to write a gratitude list. Theyre not on a website. And so was it later, in a different conversation where they asked about the line in the essay about not being able to recognize yourself or is there some illusion to that in the transcript that you found? And after you talked to the school, how did you get to school the next morning? I mean, youd been taking loss after loss, despite having the facts on your side. And so the fact that shes continued pursuing you to me kind of demonstrates the entire case. "[1]:119, Dismissal of mother's charges and expurgation of records, Role in wrongful death suit against university, In its response to Fierceton's suit, Penn quotes Fierceton as telling police as soon as they entered her hospital room after her later injury about her diary and that it would tell them everything they would need to know. Like, they want to curate a diverse experience for their well-off students, so that they can say that they had this diverse experience in college . And she ended up responding right away, and asked to get on a phone call. [4] After gathering all the evidence, they approached Driver's widow, Roxanne Logan, who had not been informed of the accessibility issues and delays involved in her husband's death; in fact she had been given the impression he had been evacuated from the building almost as soon as he began experiencing symptoms. In any event, The University of Oxford, where Mackenzies doing her Ph.D., has remained supportive, and in the wake of The New Yorker investigation, and the resulting protests from students and faculty, Penn lifted the hold on her degree. Its just so obvious that you fit the criteria for low-income, but it seems like they feel like you dont fit it in the spirit of how they want it. And that dynamic, I would say, [laughs] probably played a big part in all of this. Theres a lot of chaos. She told Brandt it was her mother, and asked her to keep Morrison from coming to her room. And, honestly, first-generation is never something Ive really identified with fully. The Chronicle reports that although she spent her final year of high school in foster care, the student had grown up in an affluent suburb of St. Louis with her mother, a radiologist, and attended private schools. A University of Pennsylvania May graduate who is currently completing her master's degree at Penn has been awarded a Rhodes Scholarship for graduate study at the University of Oxford.. Penn's 2021 Rhodes Scholar is Mackenzie Fierceton from St. Louis, currently residing in Philadelphia. MF: She, to my knowledge, has stuck by that. "[2], In December, an anonymous 22-page letter was sent to the U.S. office of the Rhodes Trust, which administers the scholarship program. She didnt know he was in the basement. And its funny, cause it just made me so frustrated and I actually went back and read it. She had bruises all over her body in different stages of healing an obvious sign of child abuse.. And then the other question was: Are you the first in your family to attend college? I identify with the FGLI umbrella term and definitely being a low-income student, but I've never really called myself a standalone first-generation. RG: so that people have the background there. So, yes. Picture: University of Pennsylvania/Instagram. Shes lying, shes a spoiled brat, this, that, and the other which looking back at the time I just felt absolutely horrible. And there was also the added threat that they would report me to the federal government for wire fraud if I didnt, again, withdraw from the Rhodes and sign this NDA. She considered the advantages and disadvantages of reporting her mother, but ultimately feared she might not even be believed, as her mother would tell people she was mentally ill or lying. She entered foster care only at the age of 17, after making a complaint of abuse against Dr.. Which as Im sure youve learned since is a complete and fundamental misunderstanding of poverty . I really appreciate it. Cause then you cant think that it could be you. And still, it was just like: Nope. Mackenzie told the police her mother had pushed her down the stairs and struck her in the face. [2] Ruderman's story, published the next day, began:[13]. The situation was further complicated by a lack of cell phone service in the basement, requiring students to team up and verbally relay information from the 9-1-1 operator to a professor performing CPR on Driver and back to a student posted just outside the door. "She lies better than I can tell the truth. "They are the people that support you, look out for you, & love you unconditionally. And I just want to read this for people. She felt as if it might have been an attempt to intimidate her. And thats an unfortunate reality so many survivors experience, not having a lot of documentation. She also called herself a first-generation low-income student. "[20][m] A syndicated morning radio show named Fierceton its "donkey of the day". I didnt really know what it was going to be, but I feel like its always good to have someone with you. Raised in Chesterfield, Missouri, a West County suburb of St. Louis, she attended and graduated from the Whitfield School in Creve Coeur. Yeah. It, too, alleged that Fierceton was misrepresenting herself as having been poor and grown up entirely in foster care, with many photos of Fierceton as a little girl on the beach and riding horses, and other activities usually associated with affluence. so that people have the background there. The reporter had assumed based on her status as a FGLI student which stands for first-generation, low-income that she had been poor her entire life. Cause Ive just wanted to go on with my life and, you know, live it. Not as something that is for the benefit of the MacKenzies, the people who were being brought into the school, but actually for the benefit of the university itself, its image and also for the students. "Fuck thatI don't have [a family]" she said later. Betsy Reed is The Intercepts editor in chief. Since we began the Reshuffled journey, any mention of foster care grabs my attention, the same with Tracy. Ryan Grim: This weeks guest on Deconstructed is Mackenzie Fierceton, who was the subject of a recent story in The New Yorker. And Im Ryan Grim, D.C. bureau chief of The Intercept. So Rachel had it and Penn disputed it. "She was a foster child, but not for long enough. Whereas a social worker comes into a poor home and looks around and sees just the normal poverty that our system has foisted on people and says: Oh, well, clearly this is somebody that needs to be stripped out of here. Or do you think that the wheels were already in motion before that? Fine. I was like: Great. And many more vicious sentiments. And they were the ones I believe and this is public now because Penn attached it to their response to the lawsuit I filed and I believe they were the first ones to mention that I had gone to private school and that they were questioning if I was low-income. One of them, to me, felt pretty clear that it was probably from someone in my biological family, because it had photos of me; it had very specific information that very few people would have and I dont think many people would have random childhood photos of me. [2], The trust notified Fierceton at the beginning of 2021 that it was conducting an investigation into the allegations. MF: And with that, like you said, notion of: Well, theres no way that you went to private school and all of this could have still happened, or that you could be low-income now and this idea that socioeconomic status is permanent. But I got a bit of pressure from Penn to do that. in America. And how much confidence do you have that that anonymous complainer was Carrie, your biological mother. Did you go into foster care? And then as the different internships, and then I went to get my masters in social work and all of this happened, I started to see that continue in different capacities while I was in different roles, seeing that theme in this relationship between foster care and the criminal justice system. RG: So I could imagine why at some point youd be like, you know what, Im just not going to keep taking Ls here. Why would I do that? RG: Penn officials, of course, have said the interview was appropriate. [2], Fierceton moved into the first of several foster homes, with one other foster sibling and two biological children of the foster parents. or in graduate school. RG: I want to talk about where you think that pushback came from. Then the University of Pennsylvania accused her of lying. I took photos of the building and sent it to them, and I was connecting them with different people who were in my class, who were in his class. As a result she withdrew from the Rhodes Scholarship; a sympathetic Penn faculty member has paid her Oxford tuition in its stead.[2]. And did they say anything along those lines? "I think that we could contribute to the community, the broader Philadelphia community, and the West Philadelphia community more positively, instead of doing things that are not only undermining them but are actively policing them, and end up creating and perpetuating more violence," she told The Daily Pennsylvanian, the university's student newspaper. One home, during her junior year of high school, was so "toxic" and crammed with other foster kids that she left for weeks at a time, sleeping each night on a carousel of couches at the homes of various friends, she said. Two other women he was involved with had also reported him to law enforcement). And when will you have finished up your Ph.D.? She helped SP2 assistant professor Toorjo Ghose draft and promote a petition in support of Police Free Penn, an activist group calling on the university to cut its ties with the Philadelphia Police Department over its poor relations with the largely black and Latin residents of the West Philadelphia neighborhoods around the university's campus, and rethink its own police department, the largest private one in the state. Given the pandemic, Rhodes Scholar judges interviewed candidates over Zoom. Mackenzie Fierceton was named Penn's 2021 Rhodes Scholar. And the chain of events that happened leading into foster care? [3], By the end of the interview Fierceton was crying. According to Fierceton, her mother pushed her down the stairs and then beat her extensively at the bottom. I have all these three kinds of different rationale and corroborations. But now looking back and rereading that article in the last year and seeing that it virtually had no information. So the Rhodes Trust ended up after their quote-investigation, and I submitted all the evidence, they ended up still recommending that my scholarship be rescinded, uh, but I had another opportunity to respond to their report, which I absolutely wanted to do. RG: Is that what sent you into a surreal state? And then theres the part that felt like: I have no idea whats going to convince these people if I gave them medical records, I gave them forensic photos of me taken in the hospital, I gave them again like corroboration from professors of like how I described myself, from leaders in the FIGLY community. And at the time I was like: Why what? [2][k], While the trust had come to seriously doubt Fierceton's claims about the severity of her injuries, OSC declined to make a determination on that. Medical records, records from child welfare services, corroborating letters from detectives and lawyers and elementary, middle, and high school teachers, childhood friends, professors basically everyone who had known me. Why would I do that? And it started with, this paragraph-and-a-half of waking up in the hospital and then, like you said, looking at my face, not recognizing myself, and kind of describing what I felt like and what the room looked like. It quotes her as saying "If you find me dead, it was my mom. [1], Shortly after Penn filed its response, the Chronicle of Higher Education reported on the story. [Laughs.]. And I was the one who uncovered my classmates death. [2], A week later, Fierceton received an email asking her to attend a meeting over Zoom with Winkelstein. [26] In the second, he wrote, "[y]ou could also conclude from Mackenzie Fierceton's story that there is no actual empathy within elite institutions unless you perfectly fit into the trauma hierarchy they have created, which preferences the types of overcoming-adversity stories they can place in a brochure. So not that I think at all the population of kids who are in foster care is representative of what abuse or neglect and what households they occur or dont occur in. First of all, thats one box? Mackenzie Fierceton, 24, claimed she was from a poor background and grew up in foster care when she actually attended private school By Phoebe Southworth 13 January 2022 8:00pm Mackenzie. This is derived from language in the federal Higher Education Act, which ties first-generation status to the educational attainment of the parent the student "regularly resides with and receives support from". But its relevant to financial aid and the student should check whatever box is going to give them most access to financial aid, which would be yes to both questions. She petitioned the court, and was able to successfully have her name removed, with a judge ruling that there wasnt enough evidence to substantiate the abuse allegations specifically, saying, While it is possible that Petitioner was the cause of the alleged injuries, the court cannot make that finding by a preponderance of the evidence based on the evidence presented.. MF: They have since claimed that that is not what they [laughs] insinuated, I believe my former lawyer spoke to it in The New Yorker piece. Attached were copies of the Missouri court orders expunging Morrison's arrest and removing her name from the DSS registry. [2], Morrison, no longer employed by St. Luke's, then began the process of trying to restore her reputation by having all references to it removed from the public record. Fierceton's mother's supporters have maintained that her daughter was an emotionally manipulative girl who injured herself and fabricated other aspects of the abuse in order to become a more appealing candidate for admission to an Ivy League college such as the University of Pennsylvania. Like you said, theres also the cultural stereotype of like Orphan Annie and Oliver Twist of what these kinds of kids are supposed to look like that starts so early on in, and deep in the culture or media that we encounter that I think really ingrains that into people. Yes. And, in this case, almost everyone who was involved in the university administration are upper middle class or very wealthy, highly academically educated white women. What about Rhodes? Are we going to see these injuries? Mackenzie Fierceton (born Mackenzie Terrell on August 9, 1997; later Mackenzie Morrison, [1] : 63-64, 86 ) is an American activist and graduate student currently studying at Oxford University. I said were almost done. MF: You know, I honestly dont know. One possible explanation for this depressing story is that Mackenzie Fierceton fraudulently accused her own mother of gravely abusing and attempting to kill her, spent 22 days in the hospital to . So, yes, an article came out in the local paper saying that she had been arrested. "It is seven years later, and I am still having to prove and prove and prove what has happened to me." After the trial ended with Morrison prevailing and the agency ordered to remove her name from the child-abuse registry, Fierceton resolved to change her last name. If you havent read the story yet, I highly recommend pausing this, and giving it a read first, because I try not to go over too much of the same territory in my interview with her. Journey, any mention of foster care that it could be you notes that Fierceton disputes this account read! 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