Meeting at DeJean

I attended the WCCUSD School Board meeting at DeJean Middle School this evening. Before I even parked my car, I saw protesters at the event. I'll spare details of their concerns and my opinions about the matter--but suffice it to say I was already on edge before I got to meet the ILC 2017 Cornell cohort.

Robson, Noor, and Javaria were already in a group chatting. As I came over, we picked things up quite quickly. We settled on a time and location for our official Meet and Greet Dinner. We also put our heads together about some prime places to visit--places such as Niagara Falls and NYC. I still have to check logistics, procedures, etc. All requisite planning considered, I'm looking forward to great fun with 3 of WCCUSD's brightest.

When talking about the School Board meeting, I almost lightheartedly suggested that we should have our portion of the meeting done in an hour, followed by a group photo afterwards. Little did I know the total of 90 minutes was about right, but the photo went a lot faster than I envisioned! It was the meeting that took a long while.

Once in the meeting, our reserved row was one chair short. I responded by grabbing an additional chair and putting it on the isle-side of our row--bad choice. The meeting opened with administrative procedures, followed by public comment. During the public comment, I was a bit of an aisle bottleneck. As the commentators lined up, I felt rather scrunched in my unusual location. Many of the public comments were entered by the protesters I saw on my way to the meeting. Despite my proximity-based discomfort, I found the public comments portion of the meeting to be very important and quite telling.

Our portion of the meeting went by in a flash! All four of our student presenters carried themselves with poise. Afterwards, we stepped outside and took our group photo. 

My cohort: Javaria, Robson and Noor Ul Ain