Grace Cunningham- week 3

This week at Shea we talked about goal setting. We tried to explain to students the connection between setting goals and accomplishing those goals. We asked students to give us examples of goals that they had both set and achieved in their life. We also talked about steps that need to be taken in order to achieve a goal. We had Explore students share a couple of long term goals and a couple of short term goals. We talked about steps that students are going to take to accomplish those goals, and asked students to come next week and be ready to share with us whether or not they met their goals or not. I hope that next week the Explore students will have met their goal (s) so that we can continue our conversation about how making steps (even tiny steps like doing your homework) and completing those steps one at a time will make you successful. The guest speaker and director of the black studies department today stressed the importance that each student needs to be reminded that they can succeed, despite the fact that maybe they have been told before that they cannot succeed. The guest speaker today also talked about how the American ideal is that with hard work and education anyone can be successful, but how that is not actually the reality for many urban students, or minority students. It breaks my heart to think of these students not being able to meet their goals and be successful despite their hard work. It is our job in the Explore program to instill confidence and determination, as well as direction for the students.