Shasha Torgeson

Student organizer Sasha Torgeson may not have a lot of free time on her hands, but that’s how she prefers it.
Born in Alaska to Air Force parents, Torgeson moved to Bremerton at age 5 and has lived in Kitsap ever since. She graduated from Bremerton High School in 2011, and was an Olympic College Running Start student.
Torgeson said she thinks more young people should look into the Running Start program and said she thinks a lot of people don’t know or care about it.
“You can get two years of college while you’re still in high school,” said Torgeson, “it’s a great way to jumpstart your career.”
Torgeson, 19, not only organizes campus events, but is also working toward her associate degree in Business Management, has a second job off-campus and is the treasurer for the newly-created OC club, the Campus Crusade for Christ.
Although Torgeson said she’d eventually like to work as an event planner, possibly planning weddings, she said she stumbled across her position as one of OC’s three student organizers almost accidentally.
“It’s kind of a funny story,” said Torgeson. “Last quarter, I was kind of tired of working at Subway and was looking for a different job, and was going to apply at Olympic Latté but couldn’t find it on the website.”
However, Torgeson said she came across the student organizer position, and submitted her resumé hurriedly to meet the one-day window for submission. She was hired on-the-spot, and sat in on the interviews for the other two organizers, helping to build a team that could work comfortably together.
“I was looking for that kind of work already,” said Torgeson, “it kind of fell into my lap.”
Torgeson said she thinks more student involvement would be nice, but that many students either don’t know or don’t care that there are events held on campus.
“Before I got this job, I always saw there were events, but I really didn’t care, I was just here for school,” said Torgeson, “I think a lot of students feel that way.”
The current student organizers are trying to up student involvement, said Torgeson.
“We’re trying to get more people connected to each other, to make friendships,” she said. “A lot of students care more about their cliques than school in general.”
Outside of school, Torgeson said she is very involved with her church, and has been attending Silverdale Baptist since she was in first grade. She said religion is very important to her, and said her church focuses on growing each other and their relationship with Jesus.
“It’s not a religion, it’s a relationship,” said Torgeson.
Now she works closely with their youth group and has started helping out with events there as well, such as their Halloween party last year.
“That was a big part of youth outreach, a lot of kids bring non-religious friends,” Torgeson said.
In addition to being the unofficial photographer for her church’s youth group events, Torgeson said she works on the technical team for their band, and even occasionally sings.
Being involved with music makes sense, though, as Torgeson said she has also been playing viola since she was in sixth grade, although she hasn’t had as much practice time recently between youth group, two jobs, her position with the Campus Crusade for Christ and her college coursework.
“We’re always busy here,” said Torgeson.
Over the summer, Torgeson said she intends to work as an intern at the Crystal Lake and Miracle Ranch camps, planning activities and games for children ranging from elementary to high school age, something else to add to her resumé after OC.
Torgeson said, “I’m all about event planning, I always try to expand my horizons and try new things.”