Since Pitch Day, we have made a lot of adjustments and improvements to our SMILE program. First, we decided that the program would have to occur after the elementary school day. However, we realize that students may have limited availability after school, so we may need to make adjustments to mentor matches as time goes on and sports seasons change. Next, we talked to the bus garage and got approval for transportation of elementary kids from BWE and SCE to NPE, but they could not provide transportation after the program. Finally, we talked to Mr. Large, high school administration, and elementary school staff members, and we realized that it would be difficult to get staff members and a nurse to stay after that late. After putting all of this together, we came to the conclusion that our program was going to need to be almost completely re-worked. Because of the transportation issues, we decided that we are going to need to do this program during school instead of after school. Since it's difficult to pull students out of class, we have to follow a schedule that works with the students' school days. Therefore, the program is going to become a lot more one-on-one. We met with Mrs. Williamson , the social worker at NPE, and she told us that she liked the idea and was willing to help us get it set up. Our plan right now is to continue using our match papers to match students, but students will meet at different times of the day depending on when is most convenient. Although it was a little disappointing that our original idea wasn't going to work out, we have adopted a new mindset and decided to make the most out of what we have to work with. Even if we only have the opportunity to impact a few students, that's better than impacting no students at all. We are going to take what we can get and do our best to make this program as great as it can be. Our next step to work towards getting the SMILE program running is to find high school students that would be willing and able to help with this program. Then we will get our match sheets handed out to both the elementary and high school students, so we can make matches.
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AuthorMy name is Ellie Roudebush, and I'm a senior in the Advanced Business Management class at New Palestine High School. Archives
February 2018
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