OFFICE OF ACADEMIC ENGAGEMENTCougs Rise
JORJA ALBERT
Jorja is currently a senior at University High School. She has been a Cougs Rise participant since her sophomore year, but this is her first year as an ambassador.
“I’m excited to see everyone even though it’s online. I’m not entirely sure what we’ll be able to do, but I hope they let me organize a game night, and I’m definitely excited to help someone who might not know much about college.”
She hopes to study forensic psychology or criminology when she enrolls in college, and is currently looking at colleges in New York or abroad. Cougs Rise has been helping her find scholarships, fill out applications, and answering all of her higher-education questions.
“I really love that even though Cougs Rise is with WSU, they’re completely unbiased if we talk about going to another college. Cougs Rise is able to answer questions about applications and the specific avenues to get to where I want.”
Jorja has enjoyed her time with Cougs Rise, and it has allowed her to travel and do extracurricular activities at no cost.
“Cougs Rise does a lot of fun trips. Sadly, the spring break trip got cancelled last year because of Coronavirus, but I would love to go on one my senior year. I really like that they have these opportunities, because I really want to travel. They also have really good volunteer opportunities. Schools make it a requirement because it helps the community, but it’s so fun to hang out and do stuff that’s helping people at the same time.”
Jorja is looking forward to her future in higher education and her final year with Cougs Rise.
“I love college, I think college is really important. That sounds so generic, but I love learning, so I’m excited to go to that higher level with a more area-focused education.”
MARCO TANG
Marco is a senior at Bremerton High, and this is his second year with Cougs Rise.
He plans on majoring in petroleum engineering and is looking at many out of state colleges.
For now, he is working hard as a student and ambassador for Cougs Rise.
Marco plans on holding weekly online meetings with Cougs Rise participants as an ambassador.
“I want to focus on making sure the students have turned everything in and making sure the seniors
are writing scholarship essays. I’m also going to ask Cougs Rise to help me find scholarships for them. I want to know how they are doing in classes and how their lives have been since Covid-19 started.”
Like most Cougs Rise participants, Marco is a first generation student. Cougs Rise was there
to help him fill out the FAFSA and answer questions about higher education.
“It’s nice to have Cougs Rise help me along the process, because I don’t have to figure it all
out by myself.”
“Cougs Rise can help get more diverse students into college, because they help low-income and
first-generation students who don’t always have the resources to go to college. Cougs Rise provides them with the opportunity to actually go to college and make something of themselves.”
ALEXIS JOHNSTON
Alexis joined Cougs Rise as a sophomore at Rogers High School and became an ambassador during her junior year. She’s planning on attending college, and she is currently finalizing her plans.
“I’m leaning towards political science and international affairs. I’ve come to a realization that I’m more interested in politics and working with people than anything else. I’ve got my eyes on WSU, but I’m also interested in studying abroad.”
Last year, Alexis participated in Cougs Tracks, a two-week summer program that offers a mix of academic and cocurricular activities.
“I’ve done the summer school program at WSU and it was great. Being able to talk to college professors about majors that we might want was really helpful. Talking with the business professor was really eye opening and helpful, and it made me more interested in minoring in business.”
“Cougs Rise has opened my eyes to how easy it is to get scholarships to help pay for college. We do a lot of work finding scholarships and making a four-year plan. It’s really beneficial because a lot of students don’t know where to start with finding scholarships, and they try to go to the cheapest schools.”
As an ambassador, Alexis plans to collaborate with the Cougs Rise mentees to help the seniors as much as she can. For those that aren’t sure about joining Cougs Rise, Alexis would like to tell them that,
“It’s a great opportunity. You get to meet tons of people, talk about scholarships, and you learn the best ways to go about getting into colleges. You also get the opportunity to go on awesome trips.”
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Randall Bennett
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509-335-2980
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