One of the most important things when you transition into high school is knowing that you are welcomed and accepted at your school. A school can accomplish this in many different ways such as holding summer sports camps, having club meetings over the summer or holding an incoming freshman open house. For some schools, like South, we have a designated student group whose job is to establish a bond between upperclassmen and lower classmen, and to make freshmen feel welcome into the school.

Link Crew, a group of student mentors and facilitators, is a transition program designed to help students accumulate to the academic and social environment of school. But over the past few years, Link Crew has only had a “one and done” type of effect on freshmen. Its summer student orientation gives students a very fleeting sense of what our school is about before it sends them into the school year unattended.

The foundation for Link Crew was started by a group called the Boomerang Project, who states, “Built on the belief that students can help students succeed, Boomerang Project’s proven high school transition program trains mentors from your junior and senior classes to be Link Crew Leaders.” They discuss how important the transition is from middle school to high school is and how having a Link Crew helps students succeed in their school.

The four components that the Boomerang Project attributes to a successful Link Crew are: High School Orientation, Academic Follow-ups, Social Follow-ups, and Leader Initiated Contacts. Looking at South’s Link Crew, it is no wonder that we aren’t successful in maintaining a Link Crew. We have only one of the components, which is the high school orientation

On the Boomerang Project website it states, “Link Crew is more than just a one day event. It is a structured high school transition program that provides mentoring and character development spanning an entire year at your high school.” The goal is for freshman student to have at least 8 positive interactions with their Link Crew leaders. At South, most students only have one, which is at the orientation, a week before school starts.

For a group like this to be effective, consistency is the key. Group leaders need to be established and dedicated to be a mentor. More often than not, group leaders sign up for Link Crew to get out of class and to only participate in popular events, such as the student orientation. If we want to continue to have a successful Link Crew, we need to expand what we think of as student mentor ship and leadership. Link Crew adviser and racial equity and diversity coordinator Ethan Dean told me about what he is looking for in future Link Crew leaders. He said, “The big thing is a desire to put themselves in interactions with ninth graders. We want them to be, ideally, dialed in already with some activity or student community, but I’m not going to make that a requirement.”

Kyleigh Malberg is a Link Crew leader who joined her junior year and is an example of how an effective Link Crew leader and group can leave a legacy. Link Crew made a big difference for Malberg when she was a freshman and she wanted to make the same impact for other students. She said, “My Link Crew leader made an impact in my life in high school. When we were on the orientation, she just felt so welcome and friendly. Every other time I’d see her in the hallway, they would say hi.”

Kyleigh explained that she felt the purpose of Link Crew was “to make kids feel welcome into high school and feel like they are apart of something right when they come into high school. And to make them not feel so scared about the seniors and the upperclassmen. I keep in contact with a lot of mine that I’ve had. One of them I play lacrosse with now.”

Malberg has seen a lot of changes happen within the Link Crew. She said, “Junior year was more organized, we did more things. And now, no one ever knows that a meeting is even happening. We went from like 40 people last year to 5 this year. No one gets the details anymore.”

Next year, we need to work harder to accomplish each of the four components the Boomerang Project laid out on their website. Like Malberg noted, our Link Crew is too disorganized to get the job done. We need more academic and social interactions with our freshmen students consistently over the year.

Academic follow ups could include peer tutoring, study groups, and or classroom visits to discuss topics such as mental health and school, choosing classes, and the other in and outs of high school academia.

Social interactions could include reviving the Link Crew lunch group, hosting more pep fests, or selling food and drinks outside during lunches. The ideas for how to reach out socially to freshman are endless.

In order to better accumulate freshman students into South High, we need a consistent, present, and vocal Link Crew. By following the four components that the founders of Link Crew established, we can strengthen our student population and come together as a school. Instead of having such a disconnection between grades and students, Link Crew can help us “link” together to make South High stronger.