Peer Leaders Spring Trip

I'm going to try a new format for processing my programs since the prior one is a great way to take notes for myself during debriefs but not so great a way to make the process easy in terms of getting pertinent info on the 'blog.

Now that I've worked at our Experiential Education center for 361 days, I am starting to see students more than once (since we work with a lot of the same primary service populations pretty often). This two-day program was one of those ones, being the Peer Leaders from a high school off Route 1.

The Peer Leaders (Juniors and Seniors) came in the fall to find out who their co-facilitators were for presenting to the freshmen classes and to come together as a group.

One way their teachers/"coaches" impress is the way they utilize their time at our facility.

Meals become team-building activities, with students having hands tied together, being blindfolded or unable to use their hands during the meal (at random). They also give new seating guidelines for each meal "Birth months: January through June over there, July through December at this table." One student commented when we ate Family Style at dinner that they'd never had that experience before, and this group really seems like a big family from what I see.

The coaches sit back and let us brief and facilitate activities (we co-facilitate since there are 16-18 Peer Leaders and our group limit is usually 12), and either front-load with us or are crucial in creating transference through the debriefs.

It doesn't hurt that the Peer Leaders are able to see the bigger picture and draw deeper meaning for themselves already.

After spending the year together, the PL look like a well-run Residence Hall staff in April: friendly, lots of love, know the importance of getting mad then getting over it, no obvious cliques, and starting to mourn the end of their time together. They have been trained to be largely independent of their coaches at this point.

This was my third time co-facilitating with T, and we are really starting to hit a sweet spot.

I really rocked at

• using students' names,
  
• not micromanaging older students (i.e. letting them figure out how to get the wash-house fully restored),
  
• flowing with and relying on T (he's really allowing me to grow as a co-facilitator and I find myself being pushed whenever we facilitate in a way that is not stressful,
  
• being clear with directions and instructions (even on some Benadryl!)
• for me working my rapport with these students is never a challenge because I do adore them.
  
• Also, I actively recruited for summer staff next year and will e-mail links to this years' application and notify when next years' is up online. I even got cell numbers to call and follow-up after I e-mail in February. One thing that might really benefit my organization is more non-white summer staff members, especially former participants.

My deltas were

• to work on how much information I share with students, finding that fine tuning of just enough to establish rapport and keeping the program about them (maybe I can ask questions back to students that they ask me, i.e. where do you live? what do you do around here for fun?)
• be more aware of when I am choosing to wear sunglasses when facilitating.
• consciously think ahead to debriefs as I'm leading activities.