Fun Night at Dave & Busters!

Last night we were able to treat some of our upperclassmen to a pretty nice experience at Dave and Busters. Each year during the 3rd and final quarter of the tutoring/mentoring year (after spring break-end of the year) we reward our students who have 75% or better attendance to the program with some type of trip or prize during the summer months. Over the past several years we have been hosting the "GREAT AMERICAn Experience" where we provide breakfast, lunch, and dinner for our students along with a fun-filled day to Six Flags Great America.

This year we decided to switch things up, based on our financial status and because of different suggestions from our students. And we came up with two different incentives for our students who demonstrated outstanding attendance. Last night we took our 10-12th grade students to Dave and Busters and we had a GREAT night! We had a total of 9 upperclassmen who earned the trip, but only 4 were able to attend. The students that attended were De'Sean Hale (2010 graduate), Brittany Delaney (2010 graduate), Victoria Rivera (senior), and Melissa Young (junior).

We started the night with dinner and it was a great opportunity for all of the students to get to know each other and share their experiences inside and outside of the program. We have around 75-80 students in our program each year and they are coming from 30 different schools, so all of our students in the program may or may not be familiar with each other. We talked about the program, college (2 students are heading off to college soon), we talked about favorite tv shows, and just had a good time during dinner. Then the real fun started!!! We all were equipped with our game cards and entered the game room ready to play games, have fun, and of course...win tickets!

So just spent time playing the games, challenging each other, laughing, and having a good time celebrating the accomplishment of the students. One of the many highlights of the night was when Brittany hit the jackpot on one of the games, the lights and sirens went off, and she won 500 tickets!!! The students were able to cash in their tickets at the end of the night and get gifts, games, prizes, and candy that they 'SAID' they would share with siblings and parents...we'll see about that one (smile).

Overall it was a GREAT experience of not only having fun and celebrating their attendance accomplishment, but it was also another opportunity for us as staff to interact and engage the students. It was also a bonding opportunity amongst the students. Hopefully they will continue to show their dedication and commitment inside and outside of the program, but also I hope that they will share their experiences and continue to role model positive actions so that others will follow their example.