CJA’s College & Career Persistence counselors continue to support alumni throughout their entire high school experience. This support takes many forms including:
Communicating with each alumnus either in person, on the phone or via email every 6 weeks and often more frequently.
Visiting alumni at their high school campus every year to build relationships with staff and counselors and to evaluate whether or not these schools continue to be a good fit.
Helping ensure alumni are heard and have what they need to succeed at their respective high schools.
Supporting alumni as they seek employment, including identifying job leads and application/interview preparation.
Hosting alumni events at CJA throughout the year to enable alumni to stay in touch and prepare for the future.
Connecting alumni with summer enrichment opportunities including academic day camps or sleep-away summer camps.
Each CJA graduating class and student is unique. For some, a flexible school that offers a variety of academic supports and extracurricular activities is the best option, for others, it is a charter school, selective-enrollment public school or highly selective boarding school. Finding the best-fit high school for each student’s needs is what is most important. Here is a sample of the schools our alumni attend or have attended:
For private schools, our alumni have earned scholarships and financial aid through the generosity of their high schools and scholarship programs including the Daniel Murphy Scholarship Fund, LINK Unlimited and HighSight. College & Career Persistence counselors work with alumni to identify these opportunities and complete applications. Outside of this support, CP Counselors advocate for their students to ensure they have the resources they need in order to be successful at their chosen school.
Each summer, high-school-aged alumni are invited to apply to be:
Facilities Aides: Rising high school sophomores can work with the Director of Facilities to improve our school building and grounds while learning painting, building and repair skills.
Classroom Aides: Rising high school sophomores and older are invited to work in the classroom with our students during the summer term, with older alumni taking the lead during class time as they explore an interest in education.
IT Interns: Rising high school juniors and older are invited to work with our IT department to support our classroom technology needs while learning basic help desk and programming skills.
The College & Career Persistence team helps connect our alumni with options for summer enrichment. This can be a STEM-specific day camp at Northwestern, a sleepaway summer camp like Culver Academy’s six-week program, Counselor Apprentice Programs at YMCA Camp Manito-Wish, Susquehanna University’s Pre-College program or The School of the New York Times. The CP Team ensures that any fees for these programs are greatly if not entirely reduced by assisting students in securing scholarships. They also coordinate transportation and accommodations. Whether it’s trying a new class, traveling to a new state or sleeping away in a cabin or dorm, these experiences are deeply impactful for our alumni.