SHS Application Week roaring success

Since it began eight years ago, Sandpoint High School’s Application Week has been a roaring success.

Jeralyn Mire, secondary transition counselor at Sandpoint High School, said the high school piloted the idea of Application Week after reading about other states that had successfully implemented it.

Mire said that, after SHS picked up Application Week, the state of Idaho adopted the idea and it became a statewide initiative. Now, the State Board of Education makes a concentrated effort to have students have a spot safe for them at a secondary school in Idaho.

For Sandpoint, Application Week was held Oct. 23-27. During this designated time, the post-secondary counseling team, which consists of Mire and Angie Dail, had a goal that 65% of seniors applied to an Idaho college or university.

“And we met that goal,” Mire said.

Mire and Dail said that their overall goal is to have 74% of the 229 seniors at SHS to apply to at least one post-secondary institution. This includes college, trade school, vocational-technical schools and the military.

Mire said that, though it might not be the student’s goal, she and Dail wanted them to apply to at least one Idaho institution.

“I think oftentimes there's this horrible misconception about how hard it is to apply to college, and sure, if you’re applying to Georgetown or Stanford it is really hard, but if you’re applying to the vast majority of universities it is not as difficult as I think students think it is and so by providing this opportunity, students go ‘oh, I did that I got accepted,’ boom, they know what to do, so even if they choose not to go next year but then maybe in two years they decide they want to enroll they aren’t afraid of it,” Mire said.

Sandpoint High School is able to do Application Week so thoroughly because they partner with the school’s English department. This means that, during Application Week, seniors head to the library to plan out their post-secondary path for their English period.

Angie Dail, college and career counselor at SHS said that Application week saying that it benefits the students immensely.

“Having that dedicated time because we’re very lucky that the English department partners with us, because not all schools have that relationship, so having that dedicated 19 minutes to sit there and get it down, it just removes one of those barriers,” Dail said. “And you can check it off the list and start thinking about the next step.”

    Saige Smith, Emele Dillon, and Aubree Lane display banners for the colleges they plan to attend during the school's recent Application Week event.
  

    Riley Myers, Noah Darrin, and Matthew Norton display hold a banner showing their pride in Boise State University where the trio plan to attend college.