The Legacy Project is a class run by Mr. Personette to help you with all your college needs. And part of this is going on trips to tour colleges to get the real feel of what it would be like if you were to attend that college. During this trip we went to two colleges all in one day. We first went to Hartwick college and SUNY Oneonta; they are both within a five-minute drive from each other and located in Oneonta NY.
To understand the reasoning behind going to these colleges we interviewed Mr. Personette, main teacher of the Legacy Project, to see what he had to say about the college, the reason we are going, and what’s the reason for going on these kinds of trips.
In response to Mr. Personette’s motivation to plan a trip for students to visit Hartwick, he said “So originally I was looking to go to Albany on this trip but Albany would’ve been even more rushed I was able to procure a trip to SUNY Oneonta and when you have two colleges- so the reason I like Oneonta is because there are two colleges in the town not one when you have two colleges in a town on a tour it’s much easier than me having to drive four hours to one college and then another hour to another college, the busses have a certain number of hours the bus drivers are allowed to drive so I’m trying to make it so they were able to do this without the fear of not having enough time.”
Elaborating on the purpose of these trips, Mr. Personette stated “Students need to Invision their lives on a campus they need to see what could be there for them what type of life they could have and one of the reasons I love these tours is because they definitely get that the colleges do a great job of letting the kids feel what the students in that school feel and those students in Oneonta and in Hartwick there are so many good things going on .for me in my life experience I needed to get out of the city I felt like I was going to be the same person I was in high school and in order to grow you need to go sometimes uncomfortable areas to make that change.”
When the announcement of the trip came out everyone was unsure about the 40$ price of the trip. Not many people were willing to pay the money, or some were not able to afford to put 40$ towards the trip.
When interviewing Mr. Personette, he explained why the trip cost so much and a solution for kids who can afford trips like these, saying “Yes- fundraise. I don’t know the word I want to say- I need to push harder on [faculty in charge of school funds] because there’s money for certain things and not money for other things. I was hopeful that when [administration] said they were saving a lot of money this year by not having [One Goal] that I was a part of for the last ten years that we would have money to go on trips. I do know a lot of students who couldn’t afford the 40$ or weren’t happy that they had to pay it all. There are other clubs in this school that have trips that cost five dollars. The students wanted this trip to be five dollars and I didn’t have the ability to do that, and some people didn’t come because of it.”
Despite this, about 30 students still attended this trip- making it a well attended college visit.
Speaking about his thoughts about the overall experience, Personette said “I thought it was good it was brief. We didn’t stay as long as we liked and i also wanted to walk around outside of the campus the college is not just a school it’s also the surrounding areas and I didn’t feel like we had enough time to do that if I can do it again I would’ve done like in years past we did an overnight so we were able to not have to rush out of there based on the busses time schedule and we could breathe a little I don’t like it when its rushed.”
Many of the students that attended the trip reported that the amount of time that was had when touring both Hartwick and SUNY Oneonta that the experience was still sufficient, and many of those students later applied for both these schools.
Carol Lima-Mendez was one of the students who was inspired to apply to SUNY Oneonta because of this tour.
Speaking about her overall takeways, Lima-Mendez said “I thought the trip was fun and it was a good experience. It was cool to see the schools in person and see the dorm rooms and actually try and feel what college would be like”
Speaking about the reason she went on the trip in the first place, Lima-Mendez mentioned “Well, a few of my friends were already going on the trip so i figured id join them and see a college in person and spend time with my friends at the same time.”
Discussing the cost of the trip, Lima-Mendez stated “I think that 40$ is a lot, but I think it was worth it for the experience to be able to walk around and see and sit inside classrooms and talk to the tour guide students and get their personal perspective on the school and what they have to offer.”
Lima-Mendez’s comments are a testament to the effectiveness of these college visits for seniors- here’s to hoping we increase the frequency of these visits for future seniors!
