Quotes: Week 1
“Thank you ladies”
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“Thank you ladies”
Hello! My name is Emily Johnson. My family lives in Berryville, Arkansas, a tiny town of approximately 5,000 people that only live in such a place because there is a Tyson’s plant and a Wal-Mart. I’m currently an Elementary Education major, but I might change to Public Relations and Advertising. We shall see.
So why did I choose to apply for Summit Park?
My heart belongs to children in low income school districts, so when my roommates approached me with their McGregor Elementary School project, I couldn’t say no. This year, we will be volunteering in the ELL (English language learners) classroom to help personalize the students’ educations. Aside from the educational goals that my roommates and I have set for the ELL kids, we also hope to act as role models and inspire the minority students we come in contact with to be college bound.
Aside from the project, Summit is also the nicest housing on campus and offers free laundry. Can’t go wrong with that, huh?
What have we done?
Because our community advisor changed over with summer when McGregor hired a new ELL teacher, we haven’t done much in our first month of school. We have planned a tentative schedule for completing our 30 hours of volunteer work. Hopefully we will be able to get into the classroom next week. Cross your fingers!
Working with the McGregor English Language Learners should be a very rewarding experience. I have never worked with a group of students who do not share my same language. Education is not my field of study so I do not get to learn about the United States educational system much. I believe that this year, I will learn to better understand the struggles of others, especially children who have to learn English in order to understand everyday life.
This summer I worked at a summer camp for ten weeks. During that time, I was completely selfless. I worked 23 hours a day for the kids. We the counselors never had time to think of ourselves. Our entire day revolved around the happiness and safety of our campers. Although it was the hardest time of my life, I do believe it taught me a lifetime of lessons. I also feel like over those 3 months, I grew to be a much more mature and well-rounded person.
Helping the English Language Learners at McGregor Elementary will be similar to my experiences this summer. There I will need to focus on the children. They attend the program to receive special one on one time with their ELL teachers. Many of these kids’ parent to not speak English so their only help comes from their teachers. Some do not get the luxury I had of having fully supportive parents growing up. I hope that during my time there each week, I can make the children feel special and wanted. I want to give them my full attention while I am there. I owe it to them to give them that time.
I can’t wait to start volunteering and getting to know these students on a personal level. I whole heartedly believe that I can be a stable and positive role-model in their lives. -Morgan
I am so excited to be a part of Summit Park this year. This is an amazing opportunity to incorporate leadership with community service! I cannot wait to get started with our project. I believe this opportunity will help me learn to be a better mentor to students, as well as having the students teach me about their lives and cultures that are so different from mine. It might be a struggle at first to understand exactly what we will be doing while we volunteer, but I’m sure that will be clarified within the first month of volunteer work!
We are working with McGregor Elementary English Language Learners. These students do not speak English as their first language. I am excited to see how we can be tutors and mentors to these kids!
I’ve been associated with McGregor for a few years now. My mom used to teach there, and I worked there during the summer through Boys and Girls Club for two years. I am very familiar with the school, and some of the students I met during the time I worked there. The school is filled with teachers that love to teach, so I’m excited to begin working with the new ELL teacher! Because of the scheduling of testing that she has been overwhelmed with, we have not started our mentoring project yet. We will start very soon though, so I’m sure we will have an update about what/how we are volunteering with the ELL students!
Until then,
Becca
I chose to live in the Summit Park Community because I think that our group can really make a difference in the lives of the students we are working with. We’re working with the ELL students at McGregor Elementary School. These are students that either speak little or no English, and are trying to learn how to get used to the new culture. Often these students don’t get help with this from home because their parents don’t speak English either. I think that we will be able to make a real difference with these kids. We will be able to help them with learning English as well as with acclimating to the new culture. We will also be able to serve as mentors for other problems that the students may be having.
I think that my experiences in Summit Park this year will definitely help me in the future. I plan on becoming an Elementary school teacher when I get out of college. I would love to teach at a school that has an ELL program or a Title 1 school. McGregor is both an ELL and a Title 1 school, so that really helps me. I hope to teach in a school like McGregor so that I can make a difference in the lives of students that really need it. I hope to gain a lot of experience in working with the students. It will definitely be good for me to get to be in the classroom and working with students.
Our community advisor is a brand new ELL teacher, so we’ve been waiting to start our volunteering to give her time to get used to her new job. We hope to start actually going into the classroom next week. I think that we’re all really excited to get into the classroom to find out what exactly the teacher will want us to be doing. I’m also really excited to get to see where all the students are from and to learn about their backgrounds. I think that it’s especially cool to be working with students from other countries because not only will we be teaching them, but they will also be teaching us about their culture. I’m super excited for the rest of the year! –Megan Taylor
We are all excited to begin our Summit Park Leadership project with McGregor Elementary! We will be updating frequently, so be sure to check back and see our progress on what we’re learning and how we impact the English Language Learners at McGregor.
More to come… 🙂
McGregor Elementary English Language Learners 