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SPEAKER: The Narrows Bridge, which connects Brooklyn and Staten Island.
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DEXTER: Upward Bound is not just a summer program. It's also like year-round. It's just like a second family almost. And I come here because I feel comfortable and I just really enjoy what they have to offer. Like everything that we do is not like boring. Like they make it fun to learn.
BRAYANA: Honestly, it's really just a great experience. Like you might think that it's going to be a lot of work or you're not going to have fun, but when you get here, like it's really fun. You meet a lot of new people, learn about a lot of different cultures. Like it's honestly just always fun. We're always doing something exciting. So even though we are doing school, there's also a lot of fun aspects to Upward Bound as well.
BRENANN: I joined Upward Bound because my sister was doing it and it seemed like a lot of fun. And it was a great experience for her and I wanted that same experience.
AMARIS: For me, I'm a very introverted person, so it's kind of hard for me to socialize with people, but this program has helped me be able to talk to more people, make new friends that I didn't think that I was going to make.
JOCELYN: I used to be so shy before. And coming into here, they made me more get out of myself, like out of myself and just be myself around people. It motivates me to go more to school and I get to learn more on what I want to become.
GOODNESS: It's a place you can get like experience. You can meet new people. There's a bunch of things Upward Bound has to offer besides it being around educational, academics, and stuff.
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DEXTER: Like they give you tutoring. They take us on trips.
BRENANN: Yeah, we get to do merit trips. And the merit trips are basically a reward for your participation.
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DEXTER: The dorms are nice. I love being in the dorms. They're nice, spacey, cozy rooms.
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Tutoring, amazing.
MIGUEL: At the start of freshman year, I was actually struggling for a semester. I was struggling with my grades. They actually encouraged me to do my best. They basically brought me to the next level.
AMARIS: It is preparing me to go to college. Like it's giving me this college experience that I've never had before.
GOODNESS: I plan on going to Purdue to study computer engineering so I can work as an engineer.
JOCELYN: When I came in, I honestly thought I was going to just graduate and probably just become like just a normal job, but from here and when I would come into Upward Bound, they gave me a whole bunch of motivation. And they gave me so many options on what I can do and what I can become, and they gave me so much motivation to keep going. So I think Upward Bound has helped me a lot on that.
BRAYANA: I know that it is for me. I am going to go to college and I'm going to succeed in college. I believed it before Upward Bound, but now it's like, oh yeah, it's like really going to happen.
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