A Night of Firsts and Lasts

This Wednesday night, was the presentation of the Ivy League Connection to the school board. Tonight all of the ILCers and their parents convened at Lavonya DeJean Middle School once again. My mother and I arrived at  DeJean shortly before 6 PM. Mostly everyone was there already and the rest of the members of the ILC arrived within the next few minutes.

As always, Don was highly prepared for tonight. He arrived with a cart piled up with the ILC banner and other items for us to use for the group picture we planned to take. He also had already reserved our seats with some very flattering reserved signs.

Don gathered us and we briefly went over our positions for the presentations and for the picture. Don explained Shreejal and Hawi would need to be closest to the podium since they were speaking for their respective cohorts. He stressed that even the few seconds it would take Shreejal and Hawi to get into their position were of value since we were only allotted five minutes for the entire presentation. After receiving instructions from Don, it was only a matter of waiting until 6:30 PM when the meeting was meant to start.

The school board meeting began with the Pledge of Allegiance and a roll call of all the board members. Time was also spent adjusting the agenda and making a few other procedural motions. Shortly after, we moved on to the presentations. The first presentation on the agenda was carried out by Advocates for Equity in Education Recognitions. Their presentation was to recognize some district faculty members for the part they played in advocating for education. The second presentation was by Healthy Richmond who spoke on recommendations related to improving school climate. These two presentations were quite short so our time to present came faster than I expected.

Once it was our time to present, Don gave a short introduction to the program and gave the board perspective of just how much this program changes the lives of the ILCers. After Don’s introduction, it was Shreejal’s and Hawi’s turn to speak on behalf of our cohorts. Considering they only had 75 seconds and had to speak very fast to stay within the time frame, they both gave great speeches and were able to articulate well our excitement and gratitude to the board. Thankfully, we were able to finish the presentation even with a few seconds to spare.

After our presentation, we stepped outside to take our group picture. The process of getting everyone into position for the picture was quite an extensive one. This is considering that there were less than 20 people in the picture. Don had mentioned earlier that evening that a previous ILC picture had included around 96 people. I can’t help but wonder how long that photo session lasted and how much time Don had to spend editing. An ILC of that size also brings into perspective how much the number of ILCers has dwindled since there is only 8 of us this year. Hopefully, the ILC can once be that size again and continue changing the lives of students in our district.

Overall, the ILC presentation to the school board was another great milestone in our journey. I got to attend my first school board and realize how much more there is to the decisions that impact our school life. I also got to see the other ILCers one more time before we all reunite again on July 5th at 2 AM to depart to UChicago and Vanderbilt.

The 2018 Ivy League Connection