page 1 | 2

by Tara Maguire

So, administrators added an advisor-student meeting to the Welcome Week schedule. The meeting also gave freshmen a chance to ask questions concerning academics and to start mapping out their academic careers. In addition, this year’s freshmen will meet with their advisors in either September or October, and then again in November. Students who have a failing grade at mid-term will be required to see their advisors. This will give freshmen an opportunity to get advice and counsel a minimum of three times during the fall semester.

Besides changes to Welcome Week, the university also launched a new mentor program called Connections. The program pairs a staff member with an incoming freshman. About 45 staff members volunteered for the program, each assigned two or three freshmen.

“It’s just another way for freshmen to feel connected to Schreiner. The staff member’s role is to serve as a mentor to his or her assigned students. Those who signed up for Connections were trained. We told them that as mentors, they should ‘be there’ for the students—answer any questions they might have, send them a card on their birthday or take them to lunch in the dining hall,” Layton said. Freshmen are already responding positively to Connections. According to a survey conducted in September, 73 percent of responding freshmen felt the experience was “good or excellent” and 21 percent were “satisfied” with it. “This is a very positive beginning for a program we hope to make a tradition with our entering freshmen,” Layton said.



Another change was a redesigned Freshman Seminar course. Provost Mike Looney oversaw the changes and also is teaching a section of it this fall. “The Freshman Seminar course was redesigned based on faculty input. It was reduced to a one-hour course that concentrates on information literacy and college survival skills. I believe the changes are positive, although we need to wait for student input at the end of the semester,” Looney said.

In addition to the changes in Welcome Week, the new Connections program and the revamped Freshman Seminar course, the university also has “beefed up” the Campus Recreation program (SU is offering nine intramural sports during the 2003-04 year) and has added more activities for students to attend throughout the year. The university also hopes the recent addition of Greek Life to campus will improve the freshmen experience. (17 percent of freshmen pledged fraternities and sororities this year.)

Layton said she believes that all of these improvements will provide this year’s freshmen with an enjoyable and successful first year at Schreiner. “I think we are seeing some of this pay off already—we’ve noticed an increase in freshmen participation especially with the freshman elections. We had more candidates run in the election than years past. Of course we won’t know until next year whether or not these changes really paid off when these freshmen return to campus. But we feel very confident we will see positive results.”