Harvard College student makes the most of Harvard after close encounter with Hurricane Sandy
Part of a series on the impact of Harvard financial aid on students. When Michael Wingate earned his diploma as valedictorian of his high school class, he didn’t have a wall to hang it on. Hurricane Sandy had destroyed the Union Beach, N.J., house where he lived with his mother and siblings. “My mother and I were nomads for 14 months, living out of our van while battling FEMA and the insurance companies,” said Wingate, whose father left the family before he started high school. “To get our house rebuilt was a long, arduous process. I still had my schoolwork to do and was working as a manager at McDonald’s.” Wingate, the first from his high school to be accepted to Harvard, is now a junior studying government and philosophy, buoyed by the University’s Financial Aid Initiative, which has helped him give as much to his College experience as he has...