Ian DuVernay
Connection is key| Being able to converse with the students in Freshman Assist is very important to their learning. The team bonding event was a way to improve in-class communication.“I was really happy with how it went”, Vanston said. “The more conversation between the freshmen that happens, the more thinking that they will do and help them learn more.”
In the Freshman Assist program, ninth grade students can receive more individualized attention and direction to help them achieve their full academic potential. Upperclassmen in the program serve as mentors to the freshmen, and are available to answer any questions they have during class. The mentor field trip to Total Sports on Dec. 12 promoted bonding to bring back to the program. Before the trip, mentors were provided with an opportunity to speak to one another to voice their concerns and questions so that they could improve their skills to better aid the freshmen.
Senior Freshman Assist Mentor Lauren Shipe believes that the field trip was very beneficial and she hopes that it offered an opportunity for mentors to better their communication skills with their mentees and each other.
“My biggest takeaway was probably just talking about how we can better ourselves for the kids in different ways and how you need to be more positive and more motivational [towards them],” Shipe said.
Hoping to teach the mentors how to communicate better to encourage the freshmen, Freshman Assist teachers such as Eric Vanston continue to find different ways to improve both the environment and the relationship between mentors.
“The goal of the field trip was to build connections with each other, learn from each other to grow as mentors and to have a good time,” Vanston said. “It helped because we got a chance to have a lot of discussion around what is going well and what is not in our classrooms.”
Mentors are not the only ones who benefited from the field trip, the freshmen who weren’t in attendance will find the improvements discussed put in place. Freshman Assist student, Patrick Thomas thinks that his mentors help him be better in class and help him continue to learn.
“The mentors help me get my work done and it is easy to ask [the mentors] some questions,” Thomas said.
Freshman Assist also provides opportunities for freshmen to get to meet students that they may not know otherwise. Thomas is happy that he joined Freshman Assist, and enjoys time with his mentors in class.
“I share my classes with them, which was a good way to get to know them and we actually talk a lot, like if we’re done with our work or if we’re bored,” Thomas said. “Some of the time we will just talk and have conversations and it is fun.”
Coming together in a more informal environment, the mentors were able to learn what else they should do to provide the best learning experience for the freshmen.
“[The event was] just to be able to talk about what we’re doing right, what we’re doing wrong, how we can better ourselves and become better as a group, like a united front kind of thing to prove that they can talk to any of us and if they need help, we’re all there for them,” Shipe said.
