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Join Marc at EXPLO Pre-College! 

Take a trip through his day to see the college experience he created for himself. What will yours look like?

16What Lights Me Up

“I like building things—and taking them apart. When I was little I got in trouble for taking apart my mom’s PC, but I got it working again! Now I’m in my high school’s robotics team. I’m also learning guitar, but honestly, spend more time customizing it than playing it.”

Marc

 

Age: 16, rising 11th grader 

Program: EXPLO Pre-College Engineering Concentration 

My Day at EXPLO

Breakfast
8:00 AM

I’m not a huge breakfast person but I did fill up on hashbrowns and oat milk.

Concentration
Periods 1 + 2
9:00 AM

Engineering

Yesterday we prototyped our final project – a headband that calculates body temperature for athletes.  We brought those with us this morning when we took a trip today to Advanced Functional Fabrics of America in Cambridge.  We met with the CEO, who showed us projects they are working on where they are embedding electronics into fabric. It’s pretty cool.  Then she gave us feedback on our projects.

Engineering-1

Lunch
12:30 PM

Got back just in time to get a beef enchilada in the dining hall and then I remembered I needed to swap out my laundry. Thankfully I set an alarm this time. Eventually I will get the hang of this laundry thing.  Yes, Mom, I am now appreciating you more.

Concentration Period 3
2:00 PM

Engineering

Well, the feedback we got was that the rate at our device sent back data was too irregular, so we spent most of the rest of the afternoon redesigning.  I do like the fact that you’re “done” when what you’ve built actually works the way it’s supposed to.

engineering speaker?-1

Community Meeting
3:45 PM

community meeting-1

Open Time
4:00 PM

It was nice to just walk part way around the lake – it’s longer than I thought! Went with Bran, Lira, and Liam.  Afterwards, I brought my guitar to the student lounge.  Liam brought his guitar, too.  We played together and then started getting requests and people started singing.   Let’s just say that Liam is way way better than me, but it was fun to goof around and I was able to meet a bunch of new people.

lake waban-1

Dinner
6:00 PM

Gorgo, Liam and I had dinner together.  I had the Chicken Tinga (pretty good) and they had the Tofu Sofrita. During dinner, there was this flash mob that showed up in the dining hall and did a dance.  It was wild!  It’s kind of interesting.  Strange?  Surprising? Things just happen here more than they do at home.

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Living Group Check-In
7:15 PM

Some guy’s on my floor are trying to get me to play the guitar in the coffee house tonight.  I don’t want to do it by myself.  I’m not terrible, but I’m sure not good.

Evening Programs
7:30 PM

At the last minute Liam, and I decided to be the guitarists for two girls we met this afternoon in the student lounge.  Priscilla and Simone.  They are real singers – harmony and all.  So the fact that I’m not that great didn’t make that much of a difference.  The coffee house was amazing.  There are so many talented kids here.

guitar

Residence Hall Check-In
10:15 PM

This afternoon, Avery and Claude went into town and brought back loads of cookies, chips, dips, and popcorn.  The whole living group sat around the floor lounge, ate, debated who had the best performance of the night, and strategized as to how we might win the house cup.