⛏️Greetings, reader! Welcome to the Salem Upward Bound Summer Session 2024 weekly blog. This year's blog is written by rising senior, Austin Poling. Photos have generously been provided by Cegina Ray and members of the UB Summer Session Staff. This year's theme is "Craft Your Way To College", inspired by the popular 2011 game: Minecraft. I hope you enjoy these weekly updates to what our students have been getting up to at the Salem College campus (and outside it 😉). So grab your pickaxe and your torches as we venture into the beginning of this year's Summer Session!⛏️
Move-In Day: We started the week off by moving all of our required luggage for the week into the dorms. Those who got there earlier got to spend some free time in the Tiger's Den catching up with their fellow Summer Session students. Soon after was dinner, where the chefs served an excellent meal as they do every year. The staff would later give an introduction to the program before welcoming us with a trivia game. Whoever guessed which prompt correlated with one of the UB Summer staff members correctly the most would be the winner. The prompts left many scratching their heads but, in the end, it was Angelena Zifka who came out on top!
Day 1: The day started with the most important meal of the day: Breakfast! Shoutout to the cooks once again for the meal. We can't thank them enough for their hard work! The students would then be introduced to 2 of their morning classes, with teachers as unique as the classes themselves, before they would head up for lunch and enjoy another hearty meal. Then came the introduction to the enrichment teachers for the underclassmen, while the seniors got to start their first day of Job Shadowing! Then came dinner, followed by the Summer Assistants' Group Olympics, where each group would compete in various challenges in hopes of getting the highest score. Unfortunately, a thunderstorm caused a brief disruption and we had to move the games inside as a safety precaution.
Day 2: The cooks graced us once again with breakfast before the students got the chance to meet the remaining 2 teachers they would have in the mornings over the course of the program. At noon, students ate a delicious lunch and got to conversate with one another. Then came enrichment and job shadowing once more, emptying the students' stomachs just enough in time for dinner! In the evening, the students would have time to practice for the annual UB Olympics, which have a variety of challenges for them to compete in.
Day 3: Wednesday was a bit different for the students in the morning. As per usual, we all headed up to the cafeteria, excited to see what the cooks had made. Then the seniors would attend an informative, yet interesting interactive presentation by Thrasher where the students learned about the many applications of drone technology and where it may be heading in the future! Additionally, the students each had a chance to try their hand at manning one of the drone models. The underclassmen, in the meantime, honed their educational skills with Comfit, which may help them achieve greater scores on the SAT/ACT! After that, they got to attend a prevention class where they learned about digital safety. After the long and educational morning, the students got to relax their brains at lunch. The seniors would attend a careers class in the evening, learning more about college and tips for applying. After dinner, students got to relax and cool off from the heatwave this week with a trip to Wave Tek!
Day 4: After breakfast (Thank you so much cooks!!!), students attended classes and brushed up on their knowledge. The seniors returned to Job Shadowing with enthusiasm after lunch, while the underclassmen continued learning different trades at their enrichment classes. the students would have to energize themselves at dinner, for they would be going to Fort New Salem and helping out there for a while, with some students helping load bricks to carry over to the fort.
Day 5: The last day of the first week started with another delicious breakfast and students catching up on their studies via their morning classes. After lunch, the seniors ventured back into their careers class to learn more about postsecondary education. Unfortunately, there would be no dinner or an evening activity, as it was time to pack up and go home for the weekend. The week was very informative and fun. Students started getting a feel for their dorms and summer classes and enjoyed many of the activities. We'll see you guys next week with another update, but for now, it's time to go to sleep and, thankfully, there are no monsters nearby!
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