Jefferson Elementary kindergartners exposed to college life in SEMO visit

They ate Girl Scout cookies in the president's office, visited a dorm room and met the school mascot. But at the end of the day, the approximately 80 students still weren't enrolled at Southeast Missouri State University.

After all, they're only in kindergarten.

Six-year-old John Lawrence said he wants to go to college. "But I still have 12 more years," he said of his current schooling.

He was among the crowd of Jefferson Elementary School kindergartners who spent Wednesday visiting the college campus and made do without their usual naps.

University president Dr. Ken Dobbins visited briefly with three classes of kindergartener students, each crowding into the Academic Hall office during separate shifts Wednesday morning.

John liked meeting the president. "He was nice enough to give you cookies," he said.

Megan Simms, 6, met Rowdy, the Redhawk mascot, when she and her fellow kindergarteners visited the Towers residence hall complex.

The mascot drew her attention "because he is so cool," she said, sporting a huge grin.

But she thought the Towers South dorm room was "kind of small."

Campus tour

The children also toured Kent Library and visited the Southeast Missouri Regional Museum.

The children drew glances from Southeast students as they walked in a long line from the Towers complex to the Polytechnic Building, climbing up steps as teachers instructed them to hold onto the rail.

They ate sack lunches in the Polytechnic Building and learned about careers in such fields as nursing, farming and law enforcement at activity stations set up by Southeast students in the Kappa Delta Pi education honor society.

As part of the activities, the children planted soybean seeds in little Styrofoam cups of soil. Each student left with their potted soybeans.

Honor society members also handed out books and goody bags to the elementary school children.

Behind the fun, Jefferson School teachers had a serious purpose: to promote a college education.

"We try to talk to them every day about going to college," said kindergarten teacher Leasa Maxfield, who hopes to make the campus visit an annual event.

Some of her students' parents and siblings didn't attend college.

Maxfield said many of her students had no concept of college prior to Wednesday's tour. One of her students wrote prior to the tour that in college "you go and be quiet." Another student knew only that students graduate from college.

"They asked if we were going to spend the night," Maxfield said. She told them they would be going home.

Dr. Julie Ray, assistant professor of early childhood education at Southeast, said she hoped the children would return home with a better understanding of college and a desire to earn a college degree.

Leslie Spradling, an education student from DeSoto, Mo., helped plan the kindergarteners' visit.

"You have to really be organized," she said as students sat on the floor eating their sack lunches. "Their attention span is short."

mbliss@semissourian.com

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