Fall Tour Day

Fall Tour Day

Each fall, all fifth graders from participating schools are brought to the WWU campus for a "kick-off" tour. The tour day is a coordinated effort between the university, local school districts, and the community. The tour is an all-day field trip for the students and their teachers and they participate in the following ways:

  • Touring "real" WWU classrooms where professors have opened the doors and provided a view of college education for the 5th graders. Over 125 classrooms and demonstrations have been open to our tour guests.
  • Touring university housing and activity centers where Western students typically live and participate in university offerings.
  • Visiting WWU service centers, so that young students also get a bird's-eye-view of how to navigate a university.
  • Touring the WWU library, a favorite to our 5th graders, to see the educational treasures available to students.
  • Viewing Western's cultural resources; sculptures, art galleries, music, theatre, and dance performances.
  • Lunching on campus with mentors at the Viking Union.
  • Opportunities to meet the university administration.
A speaker on stage interacts with an enthusiastic audience of youths in matching green shirts, all raising their hands.
A speaker on stage interacts with an enthusiastic audience of youths in matching green shirts, all raising their hands.
A group of children smile excitedly as a man holds a large alligator over their heads. The alligator's snout is inches from the children's faces.

How Volunteers Assist

  • Organizing supplies before Tour Day
  • Welcoming students to campus in the morning and seeing students off in the afternoon
  • Supporting with lunches and other activities during Tour Day
  • Joining a 5th grade class for all or part of Tour Day
  • Providing a workshop during Tour Day
     

Questions about C2C?

Read through our Frequently Asked Questions page, or contact us.

Sample Tour Day Schedule (from 2024)

10:00 a.m. Welcome Ceremony

10:30 a.m. Tour of Classrooms: Meet and Greet with Professors

See a real view of college education. Over 125 classrooms and demonstrations are open to our tour guests.

12:00 p.m. Lunch

Meet and mingle with your fellow Compass 2 Campus participants.

1:30 p.m. Tour of University Housing

Tours of the university housing and activity centers where Western students typically live and participate in university offerings.

Example of Common Reads Authors (from 2024)

A woman with dark hair and brown eyes is wearing a black blouse and a gold necklace, smiling softly.

Ada Limón

Ada Limón, author of In Praise of Mystery, is the United States Poet Laureate, a 2023 MacArthur Fellow, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award, and a National Book Award finalist. Her signature project with the Library of Congress as Poet Laureate, “You Are Here,” celebrates the ways reading and writing poetry can situate humanity in the natural world. In Praise of Mystery is her debut picture book. As poet laureate, Ada Limón wrote the poem “In Praise of Mystery” for NASA to be engraved on its Europa Clipper spacecraft traveling to Jupiter's second moon in search of conditions that support life. The luminous poem is brought to illustrated life by internationally renowned artist Peter Sís.

A man with dark hair and a salt-and-pepper beard, and a serious expression on his face, sits in a chair wearing a dark denim jacket and a striped shirt.

Peter Sís

Peter Sís, illustrator of In Praise of Mystery, a 2003 MacArthur Fellow, is a three-time Caldecott Honor recipient, two-time Boston Globe–Horn Book Award winner, eight-time New York Times Best Illustrated Book Award winner, winner of the Robert F. Sibert Medal, and a recipient of the most prestigious international award in children’s literature, the Hans Christian Andersen Award. His many books include Nicky & Vera: A Quiet Hero of the Holocaust and the Children He Rescued, published by Norton Young Readers. He lives in New York’s Hudson Valley.