I felt that everyone at ACU was really nice and it felt like they wanted us to be successful. In the Building Bridges chat, I thought that the “selling points” activity was nice to see what all the different schools had to offer and some of the similarities that we had, especially to other small private schools. I really liked the speed dating activity that we did, I do wish that we could have been more spread out. I felt like I was shouting to talk to the person across from me, and I had a lot of trouble hearing what they had to say. I also feel like spreading out the reps that were from the same school would be helpful, that way we can hear from multiple different schools.

I felt that the School Counselor talk was helpful - it was nice to hear from one that is specifically a college and career counselor to get her perspective on things, but I think that it would also be helpful to possibly make it a panel with multiple, different counselors, so we can hear from small school, big school, private, and public. I liked the mock college fair - it was a good way to get some initial feedback on what we are talking about during the fair. I loved the place that was chosen for the evening social, I felt like it was really relaxing and the pizza was delicious! I felt that I got to hear a little bit more about other schools, what we have in common, and some of the different things that each institution offers. I was also able to just get to know some of the other reps and their territories/priorities when it came to recruiting their students.

One thing I would like to see done is an all group icebreaker. I know that a lot of people dread doing them in the moment, but they are beneficial in getting to know the other people that are at the conference. No matter how hard we may push meeting other people, many of us will stick in a group and stay talking to the same group of people. It is great that we tend to find our people, but even a quick intro of each person would help to put names to faces to institutions. Many of the people’s names I hadn’t heard during the entire conference until the very end when we were doing our little graduation ceremony. In our introductions we could say all the basic things like name and where we work, but we could also say where our territory is, student groups we are going to work with, so we can get an idea of who is going to be around us when we are traveling. Even just saying a fun fact about ourselves, it may seem small, but people tend to remember the small things.

Overall, I enjoyed my time at ACU. I got to know a lot of people that were in similar positions as myself in terms of their careers. All of the presentations that were given were helpful, and I felt that all the information was relevant and resonated with what I am going to be doing in my own job. I really appreciated the more relaxed, approachable environment that the members of the committee created.