English author Graham Green, once said: "There is always a moment in childhood when the door opens and lets the future in." And nothing could be more true when it comes to the 5C Experience at the West Hills College campus in Lemoore.

For two weeks every summer, elementary and middle-school students from all over the Valley have an opportunity to play grown-up, as they preview what college life might realistically feel like. Most get grants to pay for all or part of the class fees.

With a fun-loving approach to learning, the 5C crew designs engaging and hands-on lessons as a way to demystify some of the negative notions about what college is truly like.

"The whole concept is to plant a seed in these kids that college is in their future," James Preston said.

Preston is an English and education teacher at West Hills and also the coordinator for Team Teach, a program on campus designed to ready liberal art majors for a real-life classroom.

Through Team Teach, college students create lesson plans during the school year and then have the opportunity to become mentors, and "test drive" the lessons on real kids at 5C.

"This is a program specifically for future teachers, with the whole goal being to take them from their decision to want to be a teacher, to getting them into their own classroom."

Erika Mendez, who will be attending Fresno Pacific University in the fall, is one such mentor and says the experience has enabled her to come out of her shell and that the preparation has been "priceless."

"This summer is so mellow and fun," she said. "I love their [the kids'] knowledge; they are so eager to learn."

Another 5C mentor, Giovanni DeFendes, said he thinks 5C is one of the best programs on campus and wishes he had something like this when he was young.

"We are so focused on the kids and starting them early on thinking about college and what possibilities they can have," DeFendes said. "If they had a program like this when i was younger, I think there would have been way more kids interested in college; it would have been a huge asset."

With the theme this year being "History Starts Now," the kids are being asked to look at the year 2020, when most of them will be enrolling in college, trying to envision what the past will look like when they get there.

"It's sort of a look at their own personal history," said Jody Ruble, director of Upward Bound Math/Science at West Hills.

The 5C Experience was started in 2002 and is aimed at giving kids the ultimate head start to excitement about college. Students learn everything from how to build rockets with a real NASA expert to culinary skills and proper table etiquette.

The middle-school age kids are divided into two teams, navy and gold, and rotate through activity blocks each day. Each block lasts one hour.

"One week, one team will spend their block time learning about art and NASA, along with their regular mentor-lead classes of history, writing and technology," Preston said, "while the other team learns about food, in a culinary class, and then spend the rest of their time in an activity block -- climbing the rock wall or playing sports; things like that."

After one week the teams rotate so that every child gets to attend each class.

"Every year we have different activities," Preston said. "We like to mix it up and keep things fresh."

After classes, they sit down for what most kids said was their favorite part of the day: lunch time.

"Lunch is the best part," said Oscar Galloway, an eighth-grader from John F. Kennedy School in Hanford.

Different from previous years, Preston said the camp decided to go corporate this year; giving the kids a variety of food choices from local restaurants such as Taco Bell, Subway and McDonald's.

Megan Shakespeare, an eighth-grader from Woodrow Wilson School, also in Hanford, who is attending the 5C Experience for the second year in a row, said she loves any kind of food, but really enjoyed "Taco Bell Tuesday."

"I love the food here -- but Taco Bell was the best."

Even though the kids love boasting about the food at the 5C Experience, their lessons and what their learning wasn't far off topic.

Yvette Lomeli, a seventh-grader from Woodrow Wilson, said she wants to become a lawyer someday and is excited to be getting the early look at college.

"I've learned a lot of new things and it's such a great experience to be here," Lomeli said. "We get to learn about college and how it's going to be -- it makes it less scary."

Preston said that making college seem attainable for the children is why he loves what he does.

"I think the most powerful thing about 5C is that they are on an actual college campus, with real college students and attending real classes," he said.

The reporter can be reached at 583-2424.

(June 26, 2009)