From 8th Grade to College

A classmate of mine, Gretchen Brandtjen, and her teammates for the UO PRSSA Bateman competition team set up an event at the University of Oregon: Lock Up Your Future Campus Day. Lock Up Your Future was designed by this PRSSA team to encourage and inform current eighth grade students about going to college. Around 300 eighth grade students participated in this event, which included a tour of the University of Oregon campus, a mini college fair, and a “map your future” activity. My Advanced PR Writing Professor, Kelli Matthews, gave the students of Cascade Middle School a simulated college lecture on the topic of using social media wisely.

 

 

My responsibility was to assist in one of the “map your future” activities. I helped nearly 30 students fill out worksheets that helped them map their future from the eighth grade up to their senior year in high school. They talked about what sports or activities they were interested in participating in once they got to high school, as well as asked questions about the SAT’s, ACT’s, and financial aid. Overall, these students seemed very interested and inquisitive about the dynamics of college. 

I had my doubts about this event at first. I didn’t know how a few volunteers would be able to tame and entertain 300 middle school students, but I was completely wrong. Not only were these students well behaved, but they were actually excited about college. I remember being in eighth grade and wondering if I would even make it to high school; at that point, I wasn’t even interested in going to college. I think if I would have had a workshop like this when I was in middle school, I would have worked much harder in high school to obtain scholarships for college. This kind of program should be available to all eighth grade students, and possibly even required by all schools.