I reached out for a response to the University of Pennsylvania and also Provost Beth Winkelstein and General Counsel Wendy White for a response, as well as to Mackenzies biological mother. Like you said, I was called into a meeting. 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. And how much confidence do you have that that anonymous complainer was Carrie, your biological mother. [2], Later that year, after that first foster home turned out to be "chaotic", with Fierceton's foster sibling attempting suicide, she moved to another one. She had seen no signs of abuse in the relationship and considered Fierceton to be the dominant personality in it. She chose Fierceton from a list of names she had come up with herself that projected strength, and a petition to the Court of Common Pleas in Philadelphia was accepted. [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. [2] Her father, Billy Terrell,[1] had been an actor in soap operas. 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. The 35-year-old has been hit with two warrants for his arrest. And I think its striking to read that back and just see how clearly distressed and distraught I was in continuing to push on that series of questions about a really traumatic experience. Why were you in the hospital that long? [2][3], Fierceton had initially expected it would be easier for her to transition to college life than it was for other students, since she was not leaving a family behind at home. Mackenzie told the police her mother had pushed her down the stairs and struck her in the face. Theyre not on a website. Raised in Chesterfield, Missouri, a West County suburb of St. Louis, she attended and graduated from the Whitfield School in Creve Coeur. As an anonymous letter writer revealed, however, she was also the privately educated child of a radiologist, brought up in an affluent suburb. Fierceton joins Ryan Grim to discuss the saga of her battle with UPenn and why the Ivy Leagueinstitution seems to have so much trouble recognizing the complexity of poverty in America. Penn's admissions department thus automatically coded Fierceton as a first-generation student, a category it was seeking to increase among its undergraduate population, even though her mother had an advanced degree[2] and her grandfather was a college graduate who had taught at the University of Missouri. The battle between her and the school was chronicled by Rachel Aviv in the New Yorker earlier this month. 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. MF: She definitely asked some questions about it. Then the Philly paramedics couldnt figure out how to get to the building and then they couldnt get me out. Rather than it being for the purpose of benefiting the students themselves. 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. The Intercept is an independent nonprofit news outlet. There were definitely, Im sure. Margulis later told The New Yorker that he had been telling the prosecutor repeatedly that Fierceton "had no credibility and made all of this up", the same theme as Morrison's many arguments in person and over the phone to other Whitfield parents. She had had a fairly upper middle class life yet was working at multiple fast food restaurants and barely getting by. And then she hired a law firm and eventually they were doing their own investigation for several months. I want to read from The New Yorker article again, it says: The Web site of Penn First Plus, a university program founded in 2018 to support F.G.L.I. And I was the one who uncovered my classmates death. Ultimately, she lost her Rhodes Scholarship, and Penn withheld her masters degree, demanding a letter of apology. And you saw that playing out right away, right, when your biological mother was first arrested? So Rachel had it and Penn disputed it. And especially, again, like these stereotypes of black and brown, low-income families, the knee-jerk reaction is like: Oh, well, theyre unequipped to be a parent. They would not do so, however, if she agreed to withdraw from the scholarship, surrender the Latin honors that had accompanied her degree, and take a mandatory leave for "counseling and support" before receiving her master's. And what was the first-generation community like on campus? 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. That was my personal statement. And still, it was just like: Nope. MF: Yeah. In between those placements, she slept at friends' houses for long periods. She ruined her moms career. So those questions came like later on and were really a part of the initial interrogation. And that feels like one of them where it feels like the system is willfully misunderstanding reality in order to bend it in their direction. She entered foster care only at the age of 17, after making a complaint of abuse against Dr.. 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. And eventually they filed a big wrongful death lawsuit in August 2020. And now they have to face the fact that someone who looks like them, who shares all these identities with them, could be the source of all of this harm. It quotes her as saying "If you find me dead, it was my mom. He was earlier arrested in Chattanooga, Tennessee. RG: That they would forward charges to the federal government of wire fraud. And all of us, no matter what our situation, are not completely safe from it. And youre getting instruction from a university official that thats how youre supposed to fill it out, thats what the definition says online. So those questions really came later. [2], Almost three months later, The New Yorker ran a longer article about Fierceton, which had taken the magazine eight months to report and fact-check. Picture: University of Pennsylvania/Instagram. And she ended up responding right away, and asked to get on a phone call. Raised in Chesterfield, Missouri, a West County suburb of St. Louis, she attended and graduated from the Whitfield School in Creve Coeur. So thats the background of him. We started building this, and this is exactly who we built it for. The notation in her transcript remains. Have you ever heard of her case? I had never heard of FGLI, but these labels resonated with a story I was still trying to process. So Im not sure how much could have been missing. She shared with the former screenshots of online chats and printouts of emails with representatives of the, The Rhodes Trust report found that the Penn police had no records of any calls to them from Fierceton about this. Because thats not how we understand poverty. And I think its true. In the presence of her mother that night at their house, Mackenzie repeated the same story to a visiting caseworker, who appeared to accept it. And I was actually really nervous about doing any press for this reason. [3] The change in her living situation greatly complicated her college plans as she had no financial resources of her own. We need to stay on task. At first there was actually, there was contention. RG: or in graduate school. 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. Mackenzie Fierceton: Yeah. And so when you applied for your masters in social worker or sociology? Mackenzie Fierceton has lost her Rhodes Scholarship and her University of Pennsylvania master's degree is being held after an anonymous tipster called out alleged inaccuracies in her school and scholarship applications.NY Post photo composite Fierceton was released after four days. Yeah. She, to my knowledge, has stuck by that. She found Fierceton's diary at the house and read it, then interviewed teachers and administrators at Whitfield, learning of Morrison's insulting texts to Fierceton. That evening that the article came out is when I got a call from the reporter saying: I got this anonymous email that said X, Y, Z, and I wanted to let you know. RG: Thats been my understanding of it. Just like some basic questions [laughs] and then a lot of detailed questions about my application. In The New Yorker piece, a nurse assigned to Mackenzie is quoted as saying, She had two black eyes, and her hair was full of blood. The dean of SP2 told Penn otherwise, but Fierceton noted that the school had never shared what its definition was. [2], During her high school years, Fierceton has alleged that her mother subjected her to emotional and physical abuse, the latter enough on more than one occasion to require hospitalization. MF: Yeah, it was, things like that where I simplified all of these foster kids that youre living with a biological family who have kids, which I would say are foster siblings. And like you said, like, yes, obviously I was looking in a mirror, and I knew I was looking in a mirror. And theres also literature thats economic literature versus sociology, different fields have different perspectives on what that relationship between foster care and the criminal justice system is and what the causes are. That is when I would trace it back to. Fierceton was living off-campus by then, but she and her roommates decided to leave their apartment. And I think psychologically one way people feel safer about it is to say: No, that happens to other people. There was, yes, disagreement, because I said there was blood in my hair in the essay, they said there wasnt enough blood or there wasnt blood or something. [1]:64, In February 2015, before presenting the evidence against Morrison to a grand jury for an indictment, the St. Louis County district attorney's office dropped all the charges against Morrison over Brandt's objections. Am I right about that? I think this is a conversation not necessarily for people who are still in question about what happened here. [2], In December 2021 Fierceton retained another lawyer pro bono and filed her own suit against Penn, alleging that the university's investigations into her history and how she had represented herself was a "sham", undertaken with the intent of forcing her to withdraw from the Rhodes Scholarship and damaging her credibility as a witness in the Driver suit, constituting tortious interference with a business relationship and intentional and negligent infliction of emotional distress. RG: Did they make that threat in writing or was that . "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. But it was definitely something I saw happening sort of this funneling of kids from the child welfare to criminal justice system. [2], To White, Morrison repeated her story that her daughter had fabricated the abuse allegations. I think its a reflection of the systemic prejudices . RG: Or whatever our kind of contemporary version of it is. [2], Local police were called. Uh, my lawyer. But I think a lot of it stems from the current policies and practices of federal and local funding and what kind of programs theyre funding for kids. MF: Yeah, so Penn First for the whole FGLI community. This made Fierceton feel as if she were being watched for anything she did that could be used against the state's case by her mother. Cause then you cant think that it could be you. Or do you think that the wheels were already in motion before that? And at the time I was more in panic mode than like, let me step back and look at this logically, theres absolutely no case, this is an intimidation tactic to try to silence me and sign this NDA and withdraw from the Rhodes and agree to whatever terms they wanted me to agree to you. MF: Yeah. or in graduate school. "[2], When Fierceton returned to the St. Louis area on vacations and breaks, she stayed with friends. If we review your medical records, are we going to see you had broken ribs and facial injuries? And its no offense its not like the most profound . [1]:115 As to her previous involvement with the child welfare system, Penn says Fierceton told them she was not certain, but she was referring either to the guardian ad litem appointed for her during her parents' divorce or an earlier incident when she and her biological parents were still living in Connecticut. And what area of it are you going to explore with your Ph.D.? Again, this is obviously secondhand, because I was unconscious. And Im Ryan Grim, D.C. bureau chief of The Intercept. And MacKenzie is the only one whos allowed to answer these questions. And whats the difference between the U.S. and English system? This was about a week after. So it makes some sense that they were very similar questions. 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. 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. Theyre not on a website. "[2], On her application, Fierceton recounted her background and the unexpected way it led to her becoming a foster child. [3] In high school there, Fierceton was a model student. Thats why Im pausing to let her catch her breath. Fierceton is the 31st Penn student to be chosen as a Rhodes Scholar since the distinguished program's start in 1902. Why would I do that? She told them she felt that would be more likely to get an unbiased answer that way. You know, I honestly dont know. 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. We dont believe you. I didnt really know what it was going to be, but I feel like its always good to have someone with you. So to me it was pretty clear that it likely came from them. MF: And that is, I felt very defeated too. 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. She didnt know any of the circumstances of his death. So, yes. And its mentioned briefly. 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. What happened after you went out of the hospital? January 7, 2022. 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. She has a bachelor's degree in political science from Penn and was working on a master's in social work. Yeah. 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