This week's guest on Deconstructed is Mackenzie Fearson, who was the subject of a recent

story in the New Yorker.

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.

If you haven't read this 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.

That's not a line 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.

Her junior year at Whitfield, prestigious prep school, Mackenzie showed up to school one

day in a terrible state.

Her history teacher described the incident this way, quote,

she showed up at my classroom door with a bloodied and battered face, and then fainted.

Mackenzie was hospitalized.

In the New Yorker piece, a nurse assigned to Mackenzie as quoted as saying quote, she had

two black eyes and her hair was full of blood.

She had bruises all over her body in different stages of healing, an obvious sign of child

abuse.

Mackenzie told the police her mother had pushed her down the stairs and struck her in the

face.

...