Rencie Horst

Rencie Horst has worked as a certified nursing assistant (CNA), a call center representative, a construction worker, and a photographer throughout her career—but her most important role is as a mom.

Rencie has five kids, ranging in age from 13 to 22, and her oldest son was born with cerebral palsy. To take care of him, she needed a flexible career, and photography seemed to work well for that. But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit and her work dried up, Rencie made the decision to further her education.

“I needed something sustainable, so I went back to school,” she said.

Rencie had previously attended Adult Education classes at Wright College to prepare to earn her GED. Then, in her early twenties, she completed the CNA program at the college’s satellite location, the Humboldt Park Vocational Educational Center, to receive her certificate in the field. About two decades later, returning to Wright made sense—she felt like it was one of the only places where she would “fit in” as a non-traditional student.

Rencie originally took classes with the goal of becoming a psychiatric nurse practitioner before a friend suggested she look into social work. She had a preconceived opinion about the field based on her childhood experiences with social workers and thought a career in the industry seemed overwhelming. But then she discovered just how vast her career options in social work field could be. Rencie set her sights on becoming a therapist, knowing she would need to continue her education after earning her associate degree.

As a descendant of the Ojibwe tribe, Rencie says that higher education wasn’t always emphasized as important in her culture. Her grandmother was a survivor of a residential school, which was intended to make Indigenous children assimilate into Western culture, so her family has had a difficult relationship with education. Rencie was determined to break that generational barrier for herself and her children.

One of Rencie’s professors told her about the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s prestigious Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship and encouraged her to apply for the award. The only thing holding her back was the personal statement portion of the application. That’s when another professor, Erin Lambers, shared her personal statement with Rencie.

“I was amazed and inspired,” Rencie said. “Because of her, I figured out what I wanted to say.”

Rencie believes it’s her personal statement that made her stand out as a candidate. She is one of only three students throughout the state to receive the award, which provides up to $55,000 per year to community college students to help them transfer to four-year colleges and universities.

Rencie graduated from Wright this spring, just as two of her children graduated from high school. With the support of the Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship, she plans to pursue her bachelor’s and master’s degrees in social work at Loyola University Chicago starting this fall.

As she prepares to transfer, Rencie appreciates the value that education has added to motherhood.

“At first, when I saw that my daughters were academically inclined, I felt inferior—but going back to school helped with that,” she said. “Furthering my education made me realize that I’m a leader in my family. Everybody’s journey is different, and there is no wrong path except for the path that doesn’t move.”