Rice University’s Susanne M. Glasscock School of Continuing Studies welcomed 75 students from Eastwood Academy to campus for its annual college preparedness workshop entitled Navigating the Pathway to College Admission last month.
“Navigating the Pathway to College Admission is fundamentally about exposing students to the richness of attending a top-tier university and providing them meaningful college access strategies,” said David Johnston, director of Rice Continuing Studies’ Center for College Readiness. “This event delivers both and through that helps students early in their high school career begin to envision what’s possible.”
During the workshop, the students learned about the college application process, timeline and testing planning, college list-building, letters of recommendation, extracurricular activities, financial aid and transition planning. They also learned about the history of Rice before participating in a scavenger hunt around campus.
“My hope in bringing our students to Rice University was to provide them with exposure to a highly rigorous and selective school right in their backyards at the start of their high school career,” said Natasha Cruz-Jefferson, principal of Eastwood Academy. “Many of our students will be the first (from their family) to go to college and don’t always know what it takes to get there. Our hope is that students will be able to see what is possible and aim for that so that we can continue to break down the barriers for students to enter college.”
A Rice alumna, Cruz-Jefferson ’15 knows firsthand the planning and preparation it takes to get accepted to a prestigious university, receiving her Bachelor of Arts in history and Master of Arts in teaching, a Rice Continuing Studies degree, on South Main.
“The college experience can be so foreign to students in their ninth grade year, yet they are still being held accountable for the outcomes in that year,” Cruz-Jefferson said. “By exposing students to the collegiate experience early in high school, we can give them something to look forward to and something to reach for.”
To learn about more Rice Continuing Studies programs, visit continue.rice.edu.
Original article written by Andrew Bell an published in Rice News.
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