Sunrise Rotary helps students make good decisions

“Choices” program prepares junior high students for college
It takes good choices and time management to succeed in college– values the Sunrise Rotary explained to Healdsburg Junior High School students on Wednesday and Thursday, Oct. 16 and 17, using the Choices program. Choices is a non-profit program from Washington State University, with workshops presented all over the United States to help stem the tide of students dropping out of high school, according to Sunrise Rotary program organizer Richard Hillman.
“The statistics are apparently 7,000 kids drop out of high school every day,” said Hillman.
During the presentation on Oct. 17, Sunrise Rotary members Lance Cottrell and Terry Tremblay explained the importance of time management to students with an emphasis on SMART goals — goals that are “specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timely,” according to Cottrell. “Break it down into intermediary steps,” he said. “Nice and specific. Make sure it’s a goal you can do something toward and achieve.”
“The goal is to encourage kids to finish high school,” said Tremblay. “The mechanism is Choices…it’s about how we all make choices. We’re trying to show how different choices come up and how they affect you.”
According to Tremblay, students participating in the program seemed responsive. When students were asked to conduct a mock interview of the presenters, and Tremblay pretended not to pay attention by texting, chewing gum, and staring off into space, student interviewers agreed unanimously not to hire him.
“About five years ago, Healdsburg Rotary Sunrise started presenting this workshop to junior high school students,” said Hillman. “We give it to all the 7th graders. It’s a two-day workshop…and basically it’s a workshop designed to be fun, very interactive. We have little exercises. The first day is basically designed to embellish, to get the kids to make choices and use self-discipline to ideally keep them focused on high school and graduation and going on to some further education. That’s the day one goal, staying in high school, making the right choices. The second day is more about presenting skills.”
Some of the skills presented on the second day include interview skills, goal setting, and time management, such as an explanation of the difference between important tasks and tasks that can wait. At the end of the program, students are given gifts, such as a dog-tag engraved with an inspiring quote, and a key, the “key to success.”
“It’s going well,” said Tremblay. “Kids seem to be responsive.” He recalled one of the Sunrise Rotary members asking a junior high school student if he remembered the Choices program from last year, and after a moment the student pulled out his key and a pledge he still had in his bag.
“One of our main goals is education and developing our youth,” said Hillman. “The key is self discipline. Basically that’s it. Hopefully, we can plant, ‘OK. I’ve got to graduate from high school.’”