Session 1 is Over and Done!

Since it's been over a week since my last post, I'm skipping over some of the boring training stuff that happened before our first camp session and get right into the good stuff! On Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of this week, Camp War Eagle put on its first session! Despite feeling a bit anxious at the beginning, I was able to pick up on things quickly. I expected there to be some difference from LSU's program and was ready for whatever was in store.

An aspect of the program that I really appreciate is the opportunity to co-present at two different times during each camp session. First, one of the head counselors and I discuss overcoming stereotypes with students by relating it to the Auburn Creed. The creed calls upon students to be Auburn men and women by setting standard to which they should hold themselves. Seeing how many students know and carry out the Auburn Creed gives me hope that someday LSU's Commitment to Community will be more than just "a statement of the University's values" that students hear once or twice and never really attend to otherwise.

During the presentation, we facilitate a version of an activity that I learned about at NODAC in Boston last fall from Texas A & M called "The Wall." Essentially, students are given a number of groups in society (African Americans, People with Disabilities, Gays and Lesbians, Republicans, Muslims etc.) and are asked to list stereotypes that they had heard about the groups on bricks. Then, students are asked to provide personal examples or stories of how the statements are not true entirely because they or someone they know can disprove the stereotype. Thus we allow the students to break through the stereotypes by removing bricks from our "wall" and throwing them away.

The other presentation that I am a part of is called "Tigers in a New Territory" and is for out-of-state students and their families. Honestly, I feel a bit out of place since I can't really provide a student's perspective. Really, I can only pass along the info about what I've learned in the two weeks that I've been here and I don't know if that's very helpful in getting the message across about what resources are available for these students. My co-presenters and I talked briefly about revamping it a bit to allow for more questions from the crowd so hopefully my qualms will be resolved as well.

On the night of Day 2, the camp counselors put on a skit dealing with the real issues that Auburn students face when dealing with social and academic changes of freshman year. When I first got here, I was able to watch a run-through to provide an outsider's perspective and it honestly needed a good bit of work. On Thursday night, I was very, very proud to see all of the students perform at their best. I think they were able to finally get the reactions from the crowd that they hadn't really had before and to see all of their hard work pay off! Just in case any of them happen to read this, I gave it a 9.75... only because some of the guys literally fell offstage when they were setting up props. To their credit, the lights were out and it was their first time getting it together in the dark!

One major surprise was that course registration took no time at all. Literally, the College of Liberal Arts was finished scheduling students in 27 minutes and it only took that long because some students had difficulty logging onto the system. Although, I do kind of miss spending a few hours working with A & S!!

After a relatively quick debriefing, I passed out as I tend to do post-session. I slept for a solid 17 hours before lounging in bed for another hour or so until I felt completely worthless and made myself get up for the day. I grabbed dinner tonight at local fave Momma G's with some of the camp counselors who seemed to have an enjoyable first session and were pretty excited about next week!

War Eagle!