River View Attends College Planning Day at Spokane Community College

On Tuesday, March 29th, a group of River View HS juniors and sophomores set out for a two and four year college campus experience. Students were recruited by GEAR UP to attend College Planning Day hosted at Spokane Community College and later visit Whitworth University for a campus tour and lunch. This event has been attended by River View juniors in the past at WSU Tri-Cities, and Eastern. The Washington Council organizes College Planning Day-it is an annual, statewide event. It is a unique experience in that it provides students short presentations in session format different than a college fair experience. The colleges go to the students, and it is hosted on a college campus.

The Finley group of cohort students arrived at Spokane Community ready for check in and to head off to their first session. College Planning Day is organized into a four session schedule, where each session students select a college they would like to hear from. All schools present at this event were from Washington State, with twelve total in attendance. The most common schools heard from by River View students were Washington State University, Gonzaga, Eastern Washington University, and Central Washington University.

After College Planning Day the group drove over to Whitworth University. Abbey Prunier, a River View alumni, class of 2012, and former employee of the admissions office was available to give a one hour walking tour of campus before she had to go to class. The tour was comprehensive and even included a brief snapshot of dorm life. Students were dropped off at the HUB to embark on their cafeteria style buffet lunch.

Written by Amandalyn Rubio

Category: Finley GEAR UP

Published: 15 June 2016

Prosser HS GEAR UP at the end of the year

As the school year comes to an end, GEAR UP will remain in function, as we help Prosser HS with its summer school program and take students to the varies summer camp that are being offered. GEAR UP staff has been working diligently to expose cohort students to different opportunities for post-secondary education. These summer camps will be a great exposure of college life to the students.

To begin with, we will be taking 15 students to Washington Business Week for a whole week. Here the students will be able to experience life on campus, talk to professionals in the business/healthcare field. They will get to experience their career of choice first hand during this week. The students will also receive two college credits, which can be transferred to their college of choice. A parent night was held to answer any questions they might have had about the program. The camp will take place at Gonzaga University from July 10-16th.

Columbia Basin College is hosting a summer camp that will prepare the students for college success, and our site will be taking at least 10 students. They will explore careers, and learn different techniques that will prepare them for college. This is a four day camp, where students will receive two college credits for CBC, after completing the camp. This is an awesome opportunity for cohort students who are thinking of attending CBC.

Last, but not least, we have the Seattle College Tour. We are taking 24 students to the Seattle area for three days, to visit a variety of colleges and universities. Bellevue Community College, Lake Washington Institute of Technology, and Highline Community College are just a few of the institutes that we will be visiting. We are looking forward to visiting all the institutes and see what their school has to offer. School policies will be enforced during this trip, and we have a parent volunteer who will help GEAR UP staff with the students.

PHS will be holding a summer program where students will be able to retrieve credits they have missed in previous years. GEAR UP staff will be helping cohort students to ensure they are meeting the deadlines for their credit retrieval. This program is called Red Comet, and will begin from June 16th- August 12th.

These are just a few events that will be taking place in the summer. As we end the 2015-16 school year, we will also be saying goodbye to our student tutors and ambassador officers.  The ambassador officers have completed their term in office, and received a certificate for their participation in the Ambassador program. Our student tutors have finished their final year in high school, and will be off to college. We are very proud of these young adults and are very fortune to have had such a smart, responsible group of tutors. Laura Barrera will be attending the University of Washington, Hailey Buttars will be attending BYU, and Gauge Frank will be attending Embry Riddle Aeronautical University.  Thank you for your hard work you brought to this program, and good luck on your next adventure!

Written by Diana Wilson

Category: Prosser GEAR UP

Published: 09 June 2016

Southridge is College Bound

With the last day of school one short month away and our sophomore and junior cohort students one step closer to the new adventure of becoming juniors and seniors, we spent the last few weeks meeting with our College Bound students. Like all College Bound students, our Southridge students signed up in 7th or 8th grade and like most students, they had completely forgotten this amazing opportunity existed! For some students College Bound can make or break the choice to attend college and for others it can be the motivation to keep them on track with grades. We were happy to find that most of the College Bound kids are on track to receive their scholarship money, when they graduate!

We met one on one with all College Bound students and explained why they were receiving the scholarship, what it meant for them, and how to guarantee they will be given this award when they graduate. We reviewed each student’s grades with them and, if they needed one, discussed a plan for strategy to improve their grades. We went over the list of colleges and universities the scholarship would qualify for and in turn discussed each student’s 5 year plan. By giving out this information, it is our hope that it has motivated students to think of their future plans, make new goals and figure out what it takes to achieve them!

Written by NadiaLisa Martinez

Category: Southridge HS GEAR UP

Published: 18 May 2016

Prosser GEAR UP in April

Spring is here at Prosser High School. PHS kicked off spring by concluding student led conferences, which took place from March 31- April 1st and dove right into spring break.  We had 340 cohort students attend their student led conference, which is the majority of cohort students. Just like previous years, GEAR UP staff was able to translate as well as promote upcoming events to cohort students. Students and parents were able to put a face with our GEAR UP staff, and are now aware of the different services GEAR UP has to offer.

GEAR UP staff has been working hard and diligently on a summer camp called Washington Business Week. This summer camp is offered at Gonzaga University, where the students will be able to attend workshops sessions based on the type of camp they choose.  These sessions will be a weeklong camp, which will take place in July 10-16th, 2016. Students had the opportunity to choose between Business or Healthcare workshops. At these workshops they will be able to experience a real-life setting of how to run a clinic or small business. There will also be professionals guest speakers, who will be able to give the students a few tips on how to be successful in their career choice.

Since a lot of time/money/ and effort were put into this event, GEAR UP staff had to be very selective on who would be able to attend. Staff decided to enforce for the students who were interested in attending this event. Those requirements were to write a short response on why they think they should be able to attend, a copy of their transcript, and a letter of recommendation. After reviewing the students’ letters and letter of recommendation, we selected 15 students to take to this event. These students are as follows; Maria Zaragoza, Edith Raya, Kenia Lugo, Karla Martinez, Juana Martinez, Froy Contreras, Kennia Martinez, Araceli Sandoval, Daisy Deleon, Jacqueline Frias, Pablo Vera, Cristyan Zepeda, Brenda Ixta, Enrique Acevedo, and Karina Caro. Congratulations to these students!

April 20th, GEAR UP held its monthly social, where the students are able to interact amongst each other and have a good time participating in the activities planned for them. These socials are usually once a month so the students are aware of GEAR UP services and where we are located in the school. There wasn’t a huge turn out as the previous socials, but there was definitely new faces. Mrs. Wilson informed the students of GEAR UP’s last social, which will be held May 25th. Since it’s nearing the end of the school year, we have been thinking of holding this last social outside which will be a splash!

Written by Diana Wilson

Category: Prosser GEAR UP

Published: 04 May 2016

KI-BE GEAR UP brings more college reps to campus

Kiona Benton City High School invites college representatives to campus during lunchtime, but students were not taking advantage of that opportunity to engage with the representatives, so Ki-Be GEAR UP decided to try something new. In April, Ki-Be GEAR UP invited two college representatives to come to campus during regularly scheduled class time. On Wednesday, April 20 a Washington State University (WSU) representative, JR Gomez, presented to juniors on everything from why college to how to apply for WSU’s institutional scholarships. On Monday, April 25 an Eastern Washington University (EWU) representative, Angelica Lopez shared her personal college journey as well as how to become a student at EWU.

Attendees had to be passing classes and have teacher permission. The first two presentations had approximately 6 juniors in attendance and the GEAR UP staff is hoping to grow this number as students become more familiar with the idea of having college representatives on campus. Ki-Be’s next college representative presentation will be on May 11 with Central Washington University (CWU) and GEAR UP staff are hoping to have an even greater turn out.

Written by Alyse Pivovarnik

Category: Kiona-Benton GEAR UP

Published: 03 May 2016