The dream was 30, but our goal was really 10 students. Last year, the SoCal District team of the Intercollegiate Taiwanese American Student Association hosted a college seminar, inviting local high school students to learn about the college application process and student experiences. After a significant amount of preparation, guess how many showed up? One.
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| Kids a hosts at brunch! |
I mean, the program last year was probably fantastic. I think the problem was that it was planned on an SAT date. This year, our team learned our lesson and made sure not to repeat history.
64 high school students, around 35 hosts, 32 mock interviewers, 8 tour guides, and about 10 panelists later, I sit here pondering about what happened these past few months.
I, Chloe Shih, am the 2013-2014 ITASA National Board Representative of the Claremont Colleges. I serve on the SoCal District team along with representatives from UCSB, UCSD, UCI, UCLA, and USC. Although it has its many perks and merits, the position of an ITASA rep isn't very clearly defined. Coming from the service, leadership, fellowship organization, Circle K International, I had an immense background in project managing and community engagement. I thought joining ITASA would be my next step in reaching my dreams in youth empowerment.
After a number of okay-ish events that our district put together, I couldn't just let my term end without doing anything particularly memorable. I recall sending several messages to our National President and Vice President that I felt very lost and useless on the National Board. I kept reading ITASA's mission statement: "...to inspire, empower, and activate its community." How on earth am I doing this if all I'm doing is sending e-mails and setting up socials? I had to change something.
An opportunity came forth. Our district is required to put together a college seminar to fulfill the philanthropy requirement. I insisted on hosting the event at the Claremont Colleges. Most of our events were held near the LA area. Claremont rarely gets representation or recognition from the other schools. It was time to change that. Although the event began as the district's committee project, I just had to take the reigns to make this a quality event. The result - nothing less than successful.
The ITASA SoCal District Key to College Seminar and Overnight Stay Program was perhaps the most sophisticated event I helped put together. I've done service events with over 200 volunteers and numerous student groups, conferences with hundreds of attendees, a banquet of banquets with nearly 200 attendees and a 6-hour dinner program, PR after PR and after more PR work, and I even founded my own scholarship. This time, however, I finally dunked myself in something that was very directly and personally impacting for my greater community.
I mean, at the Claremonts, you always see those prospective student programs and college tours for high school students. Out of all respect, these programs are outstanding, but I rarely see people of color, especially from underprivileged backgrounds, being represented. Where are the people from underfunded schools? Where are the students who don't have legacies and who've never had the chance to learn about these resourceful and unique places in the nation? Where are the students who look like...me?
This was the mission behind my Key to College Seminar: to enrich, enable, and empower those students from those communities who don't get many chances to realize their potential. Figuring out every nut and bolt to get this project running was no joke. We're talking about liability and waiver forms, parent authorizations, reserving several buildings on different campuses, one-on-one mock interviews, overnight hosting, inviting a professional guest artist, providing funds for substantial expenses, and just so many more logistics.
I really wanted a very personalized experience for the kids. I didn't want to throw them in a one-size-fits-all program where they feel very out of tune. I need fit. And so, with the best of my abilities, I matched kids with hosts and interviewers with similar interests.
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| Interviewers! |
To promote, our committee sent out invitation e-mails to SAT prep schools, after schools, TA junior divisions (TACL-LID & JTASA), Key Clubs and KIWIN'S Clubs, and academic counselors of public high schools from the San Gabriel Valley to Rancho Cucamonga. Initially, we had very few sign ups. By our last week, we got up to around 20 to 30 registrants. This was outstanding. We literally reached our dreams in terms of attendance. Before the last day of early registration, our numbers doubled. I was not prepared.
Two weekends before, I made personal announcements at almost all of our Asian American sponsor groups (APAC, AAMP, APISPAM, and APAM) for help. When our attendance numbers doubled, I scrambled. Although I did have a committee of 4 people, there was definitely a substantial amount of work on my shoulders. I spammed everyone I knew to be a mock interviewer, a host, or a donor (to flex students into the dining hall). I just didn't have enough. It sounds like somewhat of a small, doable problem now, but at the time, it seemed impossible. Keep in mind that TASA is a cultural club that's in its second year at the 5Cs. We've only put on some food fundraisers and casual socials. This was finally a time our organization can invest in something that directly makes a difference in our community. Although it was really difficult to get the 5C student body to help out, we eventually got enough people to take care of the 64 kids.
Objectively and subjectively speaking, the event was a huge success. It panned out like a mini-conference. I got donations from the 5C Hack-a-thon (since I am on the planning committee). We were able to give the kids these huge Google tote bags filled with admissions pamphlets and info booklets from every school. We gave out little Google gifts (like pens, sunglasses, and car phone chargers) and Hack-a-thon t-shirts. We got 30 free meal tickets from Harvey Mudd admissions (thank goodness for Terrence), we got $140 fee waived from maintenance (thank goodness for Arthur), and a few hundred dollars in funding from sponsors.
Here's what the schedule looked like:
Friday:
6 PM - 8 PM TASA Benefit Night Market & Overnight Stay Registration
8:30 PM - 9 PM Welcome Icebreakers for students and Host Debrief
9 PM - 10 PM Welcome Meeting, Introductions, Schedule Debrief, Host Assignments
10 PM ~ Free time with hosts and students
Saturday:
9 AM - 9:30 AM Key to College Registration Opens
9:30 AM - 10 AM Tour of Scripps College
10 AM - 10:30 AM Tour of Harvey Mudd College
10:30 AM - 11:15 AM Complimentary Brunch at the Hoch Dining Commons
11:30 AM - 12:20 PM Workshop #1: The College Application Process, College Resources/Programs, & Personal Statements
12:30 PM - 1:30 PM Workshop #2: Mock Interviews for College Admissions
1:40 PM - 2:20 PM Workshop #3: College Student Panel
2:30 PM - 3 PM Tour of Pitzer College
3 PM - 4 PM Jason Chu SPEAKS!
4 PM - 4:30 PM Tour of Claremont McKenna College
4:30 PM - 5:15 PM Tour of Pomona College
5:30 PM Dinner & Small Group Discussions
6 PM - 7 PM Kids are picked up!
A few key items that led to the success of our program included the following:
- Keeping a 24/7 mentality and tracking or actually completing tasks that came to mind immediately.
- Never say, "Oh, we'll figure that out in the next meeting." I mean, you can say it, but I tried my best to minimize postponing.
- I assigned zero actual jobs to myself during the actual event. I wasn't an interviewer, presenter, tour guide, host, or a panelist. I did, however, try to be a photographer...which wasn't that great of an idea. The point is, as the director of an event, you need to always be available for people with questions in need of directions. You can't be occupied because, more often than not, you are the one who can give the final say. People shouldn't wait on that.
- I didn't have to lead every group to the next destination. I delegated other people to take our group to the next session while I stayed behind to do quick scans (for lost items) and cleaned up. This really helped keep things on schedule. I highly emphasized to start even without me. I think, for many events, people tend to be reluctant to carry on a program when the main director isn't there. If every program item began and end with me, we would be hours behind schedule.
- Using my resources. I had no idea I could get so much funding. All I did was to ask. Paying for the 64 kids to eat at a dining hall was no small issue. I would have had to come up with nearly $900 of funding just to cover that. Thankfully, I reached out to Harvey Mudd admissions to ask for support. They provided 30 free meal tickets. That saved us $375. I also asked all of the other admission offices for support. Although they couldn't help us must with finding hosts (because nearly each college had some sort of prospective student host program going on at the same time), they provided with tons of pamphlets and info packets. The Google goodie bags given to the kids seemed very legitimate. It was cool. Further, requesting to set up each workshop are from maintenance helped a lot. Once we arrived to the next workshop destination, all chairs, tables, and AV support were set up. HMC admissions actually told us that if we had asked earlier, they could have supplied us with more meal tickets and brought in professional speakers with streamlined presentations and guidebooks to help with our program. I was so surprised how much they were willing to help us. The take-away from this is that student clubs can get so much support from campus departments (you know, from experienced people who are actually paid to provide professional services).
- Personal network.
- Minimize the question-asking. In other words, minimize the time people ask you questions that can easily be answered. If 64 kids went up to you to ask where they're supposed to do next, there's clearly some miscommunication. I went through the program as if I were an attendee and a volunteer host/interviewer/panelist and so forth. I provided master schedules and assignments for everyone else. One mock interviewer asked me why he needed to have the interview assignments of the rest of the crew. My response: "If 64 kids don't know who their interviewer and they ask you, you'll know what to do instead of wasting the next half hour to find me to figure it out." Everyone was to be a master of everyone else's schedule. That way, anyone can find answers from anyone else. I can only direct so many people at a time.
- Don't be afraid to ask people you know and you don't know for help. I admit, nearly all of the 50 + people I asked to help me were people I knew, many others were ones I met on-site. People I didn't know included all the sponsoring programs, admissions office, maintenance, campus program directors, and friends of friends. This is an event with a greater cause. Bringing people together to make things happen really united my 5C network and community. It was very satisfying to see all of these people who've never met each other to come together for our community. I've been called "common denominator", bringing unrelated people together for great memories.
I literally worked nonstop for weeks to flush out an engaging and memorable program and to keep on top of my academic work. It was not easy, but completely worth it. At the end of Saturday, it really was just me (and my partner in crime) waiting for all of the parents to arrive. When students were leaving, many of them went up to me to ask if they could shake my hand, give me a hug, or take a picture with me. They said they genuinely enjoyed the program. The feeling - fulfilling.
I came back to my desk at night and received messages like this one below:
Hi Chloe,
On behalf of (another parent's name) and I, we would like to say thank you so much for the GREAT opportunity you had given to our boys to see the campus. The boys had a good time. They say it was a good experience, fun and meeting new people. They all especially like Pomona college and said it was really big, nice and clean.
Once again thank you!
On behalf of (another parent's name) and I, we would like to say thank you so much for the GREAT opportunity you had given to our boys to see the campus. The boys had a good time. They say it was a good experience, fun and meeting new people. They all especially like Pomona college and said it was really big, nice and clean.
Once again thank you!
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| Sleeping bags and heavy carry-on items that the kids put in the SOCA (Students of Color Alliance) lounge. |
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April 21, 2014
Chloe Shih
