Moment of impact: Liz Cheek

VISTAs specialize in behind the scenes work, but during their year of service, most of our VISTA’s become an important part of a young person’s life. Liz Cheek, our VISTA at Common Ground High School’s Alumni Services Department, tells us about one such experience.

Liz Cheek works on expanding
alumni services at Common
Ground High School

At a recent college fair, I manned the refreshments table, and occasionally students would stop by to tell me excitedly about the colleges that they had heard from and the great opportunities those colleges had to offer. One student in particular, Adrian stopped by and was excited but also somewhat soft spoken and perturbed. He told me about his very specific interest – teaching K-3 students interactive environmental lessons, much like what can be found on Common Ground’s campus. He explained that, while a lot of the schools seemed really fascinating, he was concerned about financial aid for the non-Connecticut state schools, and he was overwhelmed with trying to identify schools that had both great education programs and interactive environmental education programs (a rarity at best).

Common Ground is a
charter school/urban farm located in the
Westville neighborhood of New Haven.

After a little research, I found a couple of colleges in Connecticut that were coincidentally (luckily) coming to Common Ground for information sessions. When the colleges arrived, I suggested to Adrian that he come and ask questions about their programs. In every session he asked a lot of questions, specific to his program and learned more and more about the variety of opportunities he can apply himself towards. Since then, we talk more and more. He has a lot of questions about college: What is the work load like? What is the schedule like? Is it hard to manage everything? He has learned that what is most important for him is to major in education, since whether or not the college has a strong interactive environmental education program, he can intern at Common Ground or at wilderness camps to grow his experience in his second interest as well. I am proud and happy to have helped a student find solutions to his college stress, and I look forward to offering this type of support to more students as time goes on.