By Anikka Cook for The Burlington Bark
The Burlington High School class of 2029 gathered Thursday, Sept. 26, under a banner of their own colorful handprints spelling out “GEAR UP.” As they smiled for their official class picture, Edward Stone Middle School staff launched red, white, and blue balloons into the air to mark the commencement of Burlington’s first National GEAR UP Week celebration.
GEAR UP is a federally funded college preparation program that stands for Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs. As one of 13 schools selected across Iowa to receive a GEAR UP grant, 8th grade students and staff at Edward Stone spent Sept. 23-26 celebrating and raising awareness.
“GEAR UP Week was something new this year to the grant,” said Ivy Tranter. “We got a lot of creativity in what we got to do for the activities.”
Tranter is the district’s GEAR UP coach. She’s responsible for managing and coordinating the GEAR UP grant. Formatted to be given to a class of students instead of a building, the grant follows one class through graduation. Burlington’s class of 2029 was selected last year as seventh-graders, and Tranter will follow them to the high school next year.
Now eighth-graders, the cohort of GEAR UP beneficiaries celebrated National GEAR UP Week by dressing up and participating in contests like pennant decorating, word scrambles, and scavenger hunts.
Student Ericka Osborn won first place in black and white Pennant Design. She wrote out the sheet music for one of her favorite songs, “25 Or 6 To 4” by Chicago, on her pennant.
“It was really fun,” said Osborn. “If you have the chance to do it, I would recommend it.”
Kimberly Bickel also won a prize for completing the word scramble.
“It was based off of college things like tuition or classes that you have,” said Bickel. “Things that you do in college.”
The girls agreed on their favorite part of the week: seeing their teachers dress up.
“The best ’90s outfit ever had to go to Miss Marshall,” said Osborn. “She had the hair, she had the outfit, she had everything… I love her!”
“The best outfit I saw was an American outfit, and Mrs. Smith had it,” said Bickel.
Osborn agreed. “It was so fire!”
Each day of the week was a different college preparation-themed dress-up day. Themes included “I Will Make History” (decades day); “Our Future is Bright” (neon day); “25 Years of GEAR UP” (red, white and blue day); and “College Spirit” (college attire day).
The week wrapped up with an assembly Thursday afternoon where students heard college advice and stories from their own teachers. Iowa GEAR UP facilitator Christine Nguyen attended.
Nguyen described the program: “We help support college and career access for schools. Our schools are needing to meet 50% free and reduced price lunch. Essentially, the intent is to help bridge those academic gaps and help support college and career access.”
Since becoming a part of the GEAR UP program in February 2024, students already have received more than 60 hours of after-school tutoring and career exposure and participated in summer programming like Camp Journey and KidTekU.
Tranter plans to continue and increase career and college exposure for the class this year. Plans include visits to the University of Iowa and other local schools as well as informational spotlights on both healthcare and Career and Technical Education industries as preparation for Burlington High School’s career programs next year.
In some ways, Tranter and the GEAR UP program also function as a bridge between the Burlington community and Burlington students.
“I bring in local community members to do career visits and talk about different ways that you can be in a certain field… and make a career out of it,” said Tranter. “At this point, we’re also getting into the age where the students are able to start applying for jobs in the next year. So going forward, we will be exposing them to local careers that maybe they can start working at [soon].”
In addition to the support and exposure the GEAR UP program provides for students, it will also provide scholarships to class of 2029 students who attend Title IV eligible undergraduate programs and maintain Satisfactory Academic Progress (SAP). More
information on these scholarships can be found here.
As the eighth grade students at Thursday’s assembly laughed and popped loose balloons, they might not have been thinking about their college and career decisions. They were, however, experiencing just one moment in a multi-year journey designed to set them up for success well beyond high school graduation.
This GEAR UP Week was the first of many, and the class of 2029 will continue to see increased college support and career opportunities for years to come.
