And then theres also foster siblings in the sense of other people who are in the foster care system who youre living with. Fierceton said later that she had never used the word "poor" to describe herself or her childhood. It recommended the scholarship be rescinded. Which as Im sure youve learned since is a complete and fundamental misunderstanding of poverty . Nothing I have is persuasive to these people. The court granted Morrison a protection order against her former husband; Fierceton had no relationship with him from that time onward. She thought that he had been very quickly removed from the building. Yeah, so Penn First for the whole FGLI community. RG: So, to cut into the interview here real quick, I wanted to add that Mackenzie is referring to a letter sent to the Rhodes Trust in December 2020. But while OSC allowed that it may not have been Fierceton's explicit intent to deceive, she had still done so, particularly when checking "yes" on the question on her SP2 application as to whether she was the first in her family to attend college (Fierceton stands by her reliance on Penn's definitions of FGLI on the Penn Plus website and the applicable federal laws; the university says that question is "composed of ordinary words with everyday meanings, and it makes no reference to any term or definition appearing in any other publication. [2], Fierceton remained in the hospital, where DSS ordered her placed in protective custody. So you use what you have, uh, which are the definitions that were already out there. And we have our own specific grad school definitions. Then the University of Pennsylvania accused her of. The New Yorker reported it was written by an anonymous sender who displayed a great deal of familiarity with Mackenzies childhood that showed Mackenzie engaging in typical upper middle-class childhood activities, like horseback riding and going to the beach.. I wrote a poem about the actual what the message was, which is so cheesy and Im cringing at my 17-year-old self [laughs], but it was about the healing power of gratitude. "[20][m] A syndicated morning radio show named Fierceton its "donkey of the day". Penn officials, of course, have said the interview was appropriate. And you experienced that yourself, right? [9][3], In her sophomore year, Fierceton, already majoring in political science,[3] decided to pursue social work as a career, with the goal of being a voice for children in foster care like the ones she had come to know. So now Im looking at one American city and one English city and comparing the experiences of youth who crossed over from the child welfare system to the criminal justice system in both of those cities and kind of how the geopolitical environment and local policies and practices might impact the rate of youth crossing over and their experiences.Then its going to be a qualitative study in just really trying to understand their experiences from their voices, which is something that I often find missing from research. And if those things are true, and youre also struggling in poverty, then something is deeply wrong with the system. First of all, thats one box? So they heard from her and immediately they call you into a meeting with the deputy provost at the time, Beth Winkelstein . Mackenzie told the police her mother had pushed her down the stairs and struck her in the face. So these are all things Ive learned [laughs] I learned after the fact. And then the other question was: Are you the first in your family to attend college? And so they had to see some benefit to them in doing this. Is that what sent you into a surreal state? And I dont remember exactly what their statement was, but they disputed it. At the University of Pennsylvania, she received a bachelor's degree in political science and a master's degree in social work through a combined five-year program. MF: And its mentioned briefly. "[2], Near the end of November Fierceton was named one of 32 Rhodes scholars from the U.S. for the year. 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. [2], Fierceton supplied the trust's investigators with her medical and court records from the mid-2010s as well as letters from 26 peopleteachers at Whitfield, the three Penn faculty members who had written her Rhodes recommendation letters, vouching for her abuse claims and saying she had never misrepresented herself. I have some of my own theories, but I want to hear yours. . She bounced from one foster home to the next. But the outline of the story is this: Mackenzie was raised in a wealthy St. Louis suburb by a single mother who was repeatedly abusive, according to two state agencies. Both reports refrained from expressing an opinion about the truth of her abuse allegations. She ruined her moms career. Mackenzie Fierceton was championed as a former foster youth who had overcome an abusive childhood and won a prestigious Rhodes Scholarship. RG: Mhmm. And when will you have finished up your Ph.D.? In 2019, Fierceton testified in a court hearing that, in September 2014, her mother allegedly pushed her down a set of stairs and hit her in the face several times. And so, yes, if the student, then, is no longer useful, I could imagine it turning. Yeah. She had bruises all over her body in different stages of healing an obvious sign of child abuse., No, I found it before. Raised in Chesterfield, Missouri, a West County suburb of St. Louis, she attended and graduated from the Whitfield School in Creve Coeur. The fact that they even challenged that really does expose a lot of whats going on here because I assume in their mind, theyre saying: Well, she went to this private school; she had a nice house; her mom probably drove a nice car maybe you even drove a decent car! 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. And Im glad that people are having the kinds of systemic discussions that are so key to all of this. Right. 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. "Once you do something that the University sees as undermining its quest for power and prestige, it will not think twice about discarding you, humiliating you, and retaliating against you, which is exactly what they did" said one SP2 student in support of Fierceton. I mean, youd been taking loss after loss, despite having the facts on your side. Fine. 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. And like you said, like, yes, obviously I was looking in a mirror, and I knew I was looking in a mirror. Did you go into foster care? She told them she felt that would be more likely to get an unbiased answer that way. I think youre right. Others echoed the criticism. [2], Local police were called. And because poverty and abuse are so pervasive in society and particularly in a country that has such a minimal social safety net and has so much violence. Since we began the Reshuffled journey, any mention of foster care grabs my attention, the same with Tracy. How many people kind of fit that category that you interacted with, and how many kind of fit closer to your category, not just in your own interactions, but also in your research? Her junior year at Whitfield, a prestigious prep school, Mackenzie showed up to school one day in a terrible state. What happened the night you ended up in foster care? But yeah, that, I guess, just one point of clarification that I recently, in the last few months, just found out about. She entered foster care only at the age of 17, after making a complaint of abuse against Dr.. And its funny, cause it just made me so frustrated and I actually went back and read it. 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. Mother and daughter both told the same stories they had earlier; Morrison depicted her daughter as "willful and intense", claiming she had bought and read many books to try to help her understand the issues she said Fierceton had. RG: Like, those two things dont fit together. [3], By the end of the interview Fierceton was crying. Mackenzie Fierceton was deposed after seeking justice for a mature student, Cameron Driver, 38. [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. MF: So those questions really came later. "Fuck thatI don't have [a family]" she said later. And I think said something along the lines of there were things missing and it was distorted. [2], Two months later the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. It finds the definition the university's office uses, without that language, as being more determinative; Penn First, the FGLI student organization Fierceton had been involved with, also used that definition on its website for most of the time she was an undergraduate. And I just want to read this for people. My understanding is there were two anonymous emails. Photograph by Robbie Lawrence for The New Yorker Mackenzie Fierceton grew up in a middle-class suburb of St. Louis. Right. This could happen to me. So Im not sure how much could have been missing. She entered foster care only at the age of 17, after making a complaint of abuse against Dr. Morrison a complaint that a court later found not to be credible. And The New Yorker article also alluded to a few things that you had gotten loose with in a couple of paragraphs. Enough bruises? And one of the main things they pointed to was that she had gone to this private school . Just like some basic questions [laughs] and then a lot of detailed questions about my application. And youre getting instruction from a university official that thats how youre supposed to fill it out, thats what the definition says online. And I dont remember all of the questions, but it was a really intense, rapid fire of really difficult and challenging questions. So to me it was pretty clear that it likely came from them. I was in this private school with a lot of upper-middle class or wealthy white students. But it did open with these literary elements of what I was feeling like, and the experience I was having in those moments. And I havent been on any of the Penn websites. As in Fierceton's case, it took an hour to remove Driver from the building. And its funny, cause it just made me so frustrated and I actually went back and read it. MF: You know, I honestly dont know. We dont believe you. Mackenzie is the soap's first transgender character, added to the series after Stone wrote to executive producer Jason Herbison to pitch the character. So yes, I know that is me. So I was like: OK, fine. And thats actually one of the things that, if there was any doubt whatsoever about this story, in some ways it was settled by that. The New Yorker reported that Fierceton reported this to Penn's campus police, fearing that her mother had somehow found out where she was living. Professor Walter Licht, a Penn historian who runs the program, recalls her as the sort of student who would "[ask] a question that makes everyone stop and brings the conversation to a different pitch." And that was the end of it, right? She began to realize that she had no sense of identity. And so where is your story now? And it just felt pretty devastating to me, because for so long I hid everything, Id been so ashamed, and I already felt so much guilt in coming forward then. I tried to help as much as I could. RG: I think for a lot of us, we have to sort of other poverty and abuse and put it in a box, partly, to protect ourselves. MF: Just a quick circling back, Im actually not sure if it was her who first reached out or if it was General Counsel Wendy White, because I later found out that they had a phone call about 36 hours after the article came out and seemed to talk pretty extensively, and then there were a lot of emails that happened. So, I myself, had a seizure in the basement of my grad school in January, 2020, and it took over an hour to get me out of the basement because they couldnt fit a stretcher or a backboard down the stairs or the elevator. Like what does Penn say when you tell them: Hey, the Penn official who helped me fill this out said that these are the categories that I fit. Later in the year she wrote online that the name change gave her "ownership of her identity" and a sense of agency she had not had before in her life. But that was definitely a driving force for why I decided, ultimately, to withdraw because I felt like: OK, federal prison is no joke. [2], "Family is not the people you are related to by blood," she wrote in the diary. MF: Absolutely. RG: Or whatever our kind of contemporary version of it is. But it doesnt mean you were always low-income, just that you are now. [c] Chewing was difficult as well, and she had a feeding tube inserted. But those definitions arent anywhere to be found. Her admission to Oxford was unaffected, and she began her graduate studies in sociology there later in the year, with a Penn professor covering her tuition. So that was what the actual poem and personal statement was about [laughs.] So Im not sure how much could have been missing. And I think I just share that because I think its a powerful example of if that is as far as theyre going to go when theres literal documentation from child me and that accusing me of that being faked, I really am like: I dont know, short of a video montage of instances of abuse from 6 to 16, what would convince them. When they did, they were unable to get stretchers or backboards down Caster's stairways or elevators as there was insufficient space. But afterwards she was anxious enough about how her mother might react to remain on the other side of the kitchen counter island from Morrison while they talked in the kitchen, "bracing for impact", she wrote in her diary. I do think that it is a huge defense mechanism that people deploy. In between those placements, she slept at friends' houses for long periods. And I was the one who uncovered my classmates death. So it makes some sense that they were very similar questions. What about Rhodes? . Fierceton said that when she had applied to SP2 as a sophomore she had cleared it with the school's associate director of admissions, who told her that a student's biological parents were not relevant to that definition, and said the same thing in 2020 (Penn's OSC interviewed the associate director and SP2's associate director for financial aid whom Fierceton said she had a similar conversation with; neither remembered speaking with Fierceton about the issue)[1]:111112). I think this is a conversation not necessarily for people who are still in question about what happened here. And so I was like, of course, Im going to respond again. 207 1,590 6,062 Show this thread Mackenzie Fierceton @MFierceton Aug 8 Will never not make my day to see this on the shelf. Yes. 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. RG: And I just want to read this for people. MF: At first there was actually, there was contention. RG: And all of us, no matter what our situation, are not completely safe from it. [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. Then, the first-generation box. Why were you in the hospital that long? "They are the people that support you, look out for you, & love you unconditionally. Yeah. Why would I do that? The 35-year-old has been hit with two warrants for his arrest. RG: Right. Consider what the world of media would look like without The Intercept. "She was a foster child, but not for long enough. So, to cut into the interview here real quick, I wanted to add that Mackenzie is referring to a letter sent to the Rhodes Trust in December 2020. Her mothers name was entered into a registry of abusers. And please go and leave us a rating or a review it helps people find the show. Instead, I want to talk more about what this says about the system, that something so seemingly irrational could be produced by this system, and actually could be predicted to be produced by this system in some ways. Because processes become Kafkaesque very quickly. I had never heard of FGLI, but these labels resonated with a story I was still trying to process. At her request Penn kept her contact information out of the school's directory on its website. Her mother was a doctor and Fierceton attended a prep school, but she was. "[25], "I cannot avoid the sense that Mackenzie is being faulted for not having suffered enough", Norton told The New Yorker. Within days of the article being published, the universitys general counsel was in touch with Mackenzies mother. Or is this something thats been overlooked? She is suing Penn for defamation, arguing its real goal in investigating her was to discredit her as a witness in and retaliate for a wrongful death suit filed against the university by the widow of a fellow student which Fierceton instigated. Theres people who span all different kinds of experiences. So thats the background of him. And then it just launched into the first half being a line-by-line it felt like interrogation of my applications. Enough blood? What kind of a group is that? RG: Right. Cause I had assumed it was her. RG: And what was the first-generation community like on campus? But now looking back and rereading that article in the last year and seeing that it virtually had no information. And is it somewhat of a defense mechanism that people deploy to protect themselves? If youd like to support our work, go to theintercept.com/give your donation, no matter what the amount, makes a real difference. And that is part of what felt like it gave me such a home, is because we had these sort of underlying shared experiences, but all came from different backgrounds to an extent, and all still supported and accepted one another. "How much does one have to suffer to have value? Raised in Chesterfield, Missouri, a West County suburb of St. Louis, she attended and graduated from the Whitfield School in Creve Coeur. After Fierceton was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship during her senior year, questions about whether she had accurately represented her background led to investigations by both the Rhodes Trust and Penn that concluded she had at times suggested or failed to correct the impression left by some statements about her, and her own application essays, that she had grown up a poor foster child. And then the other question was: Are you the first in your family to attend college? I think they do have a richer experience if they have more diversity around them, but that is more the point. How did you get to school? Because thats not how we understand poverty. Fierceton had also brought her mentor, a staff member at the university's Civic House, into the meeting; at the outset Winkelstein told the woman she could not speak or she would be disconnected immediately. The kind of reporting we do is essential to democracy, but it is not easy, cheap, or profitable. According to Fierceton, her mother pushed her down the stairs and then beat her extensively at the bottom. So one of the questions that you mentioned that they asked was about your essay , which, correct me if Im wrong, but I think it begins saying something along the lines of: Youre in the hospital, you looked in the mirror, and you couldnt recognize yourself, you couldnt recognize your features. Penn, by questioning so much of Fierceton's story, was making itself "complicit in a long campaign of continuing abuse", she added. "Without her trauma, she didnt matter", wrote a commentator in the Tulane Hullabaloo. 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. The lawsuit, filed on behalf of Mackenzie Fierceton claimed that Penn officials targeted the grad student for retaliation after she became a key witness in a wrongful death lawsuit filed against the university. [22], In the New Yorker article, Fierceton and others criticized Penn for its use of not only her story but another recent FGLI Rhodes awardee as poverty porn, suggesting the university had turned on her when it learned she had actually come from a privileged, affluent background and thus did not fit the narrative of having grown up in foster care recounted in its news release and the accompanying Inquirer article.

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