Reflections On My First Testimony

While the days have been long at the State Board, the weeks have been whizzing by as the policy cutoff gets closer. I felt like I had reached a (tenuous) flow state, striking a balance between this internship, student government, a maxed-out course load, and college applications. I thought that I could handle most of what the rest of this session and semester had to throw at me.

That was until I was informed that I was going to testify on a SB 6260, a bill that aimed at the lowering of the running start FTE from 1.4 to 1.2 (for more details check out my previous blog post). One of the main highlights of this internship is that you can testify on bills on behalf of the colleges, and I knew going in that I would testify eventually, but as the start of session came and went, I just thought that I would be the exception to this. Turns out, I was not.

Growing up, I was always labeled as the “shy one” by adults around me, and by my peers the “quiet kid”. I wasn’t socially anxious per say, I just thought that no one wanted to hear what I wanted to say. There are so many voices now days, and I didn’t want to add to the noise, so I just always dedicated myself to listening to others. But when testifying, for a moment, you’re the only voice in the room with both spectators and legislators paying attention to you, and that would be intimidating for anyone for the first time.

However, preventing this reduction in running start is something that is such an important issue. It’s so close to my heart and the hearts of so many students I know, so I resolved to do my best, especially for all the students who couldn’t testify themselves.

Writing the testimony was the easy part, it was the practicing that challenged me in this regard. I had to account for how much time they might give me, my pacing, my pronunciation and more. Something I did that I think was unconventional, but that I think made a world of difference was that I taped a copy on the walls of my shower to practice the morning of. Reading it off in such a low effort environment allowed me to develop and ease in my testimony and prevent most potential stutters.

While at the hearing, I felt so safe and confident alongside many of the other student testifiers, some of whom came all the way from Centralia to present! My heart was truly full seeing so many current and former students of the running start program advocating on behalf of the bill, and I’m proud to say that my testimony was only one in a sea of testimonies that tell the stories and legacies of running start.

With this, I am so excited to see what is next as we continue to go through session, and how all students will continue to work together to make higher education better in Washington, especially with WACTSA’s lobby day coming up early February.