First Tee – Silicon Valley is excited to share that Eliane Juang was awarded the distinguished honor of being Ace-Certified!
What does ACE Certified mean?
Ace is the highest level of certification at First Tee and less than 1% of First Tee participants from across the country achieve Ace certification. Eliane will receive local and national recognition from First Tee for completing her Ace classes and the post-class documents. More importantly, her work in our Ace classes helped her apply the First Tee Life Skills to college and career exploration, and to her give-back volunteer opportunities. The Ace classes also assisted in developing transferable skills that will aid her in her professional development.
About Eliane
Eliane is a junior at Lynbrook High School. She began our program as a participant in 2016 and volunteered as a coach since 2022. She excelled in our classes due to her attention to detail, initiative, and ability to receive feedback and turn it into tangible goals. For her Ace Career Project, she created a detailed spreadsheet with a list of internships, their requirements, and their corresponding due dates. As a result of her thorough planning, she was accepted for a research position in the field of Machine-Learning Drug-Discovery at the Aspiring Scholars Directed Research Program.
“FTSV has helped me gain a lot of valuable life skills,” says Eliane. “These skills include building goal ladders, forming a go-to team, preparing for interviews, and writing self-reflection journals that help me identify what aspects of my goal I need to focus on. I am able to set goals with a positive mindset and be more motivated to step out of my comfort zone to try new things. From my Ace classes, I have learned the importance of taking initiative and going above and beyond.”
There are (4) 8-week Ace sessions, each with post-class projects.
- Education – financial planning for college (budgeting, saving, grants, scholarships), college application process, school identification and exploration strategies.
- Career – resume-building, interview skills, transferable, adaptive and content skill development, and professional correspondence.
- Golf – golf psychology, optimal practice habits.
- Volunteer – going above and beyond, learning transferable skills, networking, professionalism
To be an Ace-certified, participants must be:
- at least 14 years old
- be in our program for a minimum of 3 years; and attend a minimum of 2 seasons per year.
- Attend our 4 Ace-Future Planning Classes (Career, Golf, Education, Give-Back)
- Complete the 4 Ace-Future Planning post class documents
- Submit a letter of recommendation
- Be selected by a panel of First Tee National judges
“Congratulations Eliane for your outstanding work” says Program Director Chris Moreno-Hunt. “We are proud of your character and your desire to go above and beyond. You are humble, hardworking, and you make our classes/program a better place. I have no doubt you will be continue to be successful and utilize the tools learned in Ace to achieve your goals.”
To find out more about our Ace-Future Planning classes and how to be Ace-Certified, please reach out to [email protected] or 408-508-4884.
PUBLISHED: 03-13-2024