On April 15th, crowds of BSM students streamed into the Haben Center, clutching QR codes, red plastic bags, and maps. BSM’s annual college fair had begun. Throughout the event, students and parents alike approached brightly colored tables bearing the names of colleges to ask questions, pick up informational material, and chat with college representatives.
As a college preparatory school, BSM’s college fair is just one step in a long process of college readiness. While it’s required for juniors, other grades are encouraged to attend. “We believe strongly in connecting students with a lot of different options. And this is just one way for our for sure for our juniors to get a really great kick start off on their process of applying, but also for our younger students to get exposed and start talking to colleges and find out information about admissions and find out about the process,” Guidance and College Counselor Amanda Anderson said.
We believe strongly in connecting students with a lot of different options. And this is just one way for our for sure for our juniors to get a really great kick start off on their process of applying, but also for our younger students to get exposed and start talking to colleges and find out information about admissions and find out about the process
— Amanda Anderson
Although the event lasted only an hour and a half, the process of holding the college fair extends far beyond that. The first step? Securing colleges to fill the Haben Center. BSM draws from a broad list of colleges that visit campus throughout the year. Initially, invites are sent to around 300 colleges, but due to logistical details or constraints, the number is usually much smaller. “Usually [the college fair is] tied in with the other Catholic schools in the area. So this whole week is our Catholic high school college fair week,” Anderson said.
Additionally, BSM selects several students to speak to the group of college representatives before the event starts. This policy started just a few years ago and is designed to give colleges a student perspective. “We asked a couple of students that we knew that were in our engineering and art programs to just give the reps that were here an overall update of the programs that they’re involved with, but then also how…that translate[s] to their success at BSM,” Anderson said.
One of the students chosen was sophomore Nadia Ehlert, who delivered a speech on behalf of BSM’s engineering program. Ehlert described her experience participating in a variety of engineering classes and programs in her time at BSM so far, noting the diversity of skills that these programs provided her with. In particular, she both emphasized the resilience and team collaboration that she learned, as well as more technical skills like 3D CAD modeling and laser cutting. “The program has taught me how to advocate for myself, work through challenges, communicate well with peers, and how to apply outside knowledge to problems. I am so incredibly grateful,” Ehlert said in her speech.
Ehlert was chosen because of her vast amount of experience in the lab, from being involved with the Robotics team to serving as a teacher’s assistant for a second semester Engineering Mindsets class. When writing her speech, she wanted to highlight the many different levels of engineering offered. For Ehlert, the opportunity to give her speech was a good way of making a personal connection with the college representatives, and demonstrated BSM’s versatility. “I think it definitely showed the variety of different things we have at Benilde. I know there was a girl who spoke before me who spoke about the arts department here, and I thought it was great that we could speak both about the strengths we have in art as well as the strengths we have in STEM,” Ehlert said.