From Connection to Confidence: How SLG Transformed My UFV Experience

Submitted by Oscar Sanchez – SLG Leader and Mentor

My life as an undergraduate student at UFV for the past few years has revolved around juggling classes and part-time work. Now that I’m getting ready to graduate, I’ve been thinking a lot about the experiences that shaped my time here. One of the most meaningful has been my involvement with the Supported Learning Group (SLG) program, which ended up playing a much bigger role in my student life than I ever expected. I have of course made a lot of friends, but most importantly, I feel I have helped many students navigate their academic journeys.

When I first got into the program, I didn’t really understand what SLG was all about; I thought I was just going to be a tutor. However, the program is so much more than tutoring. Supported Learning Groups are about bringing students together so that they learn in an environment where they don’t feel alone but supported by others.

I was thrilled each week to use creative ways to create an environment for students not only to learn and practice the course materials but to also make mistakes-an important step in any learning process. I wanted to expose them to new ways of learning, thinking and understanding. This can mean many different things for many leaders, but at the end of the day our goal is to help students understand and learn material without explaining the content to them ourselves. I believe this is what makes the program special within the university. It pushes the students to use their brains in a way they may not have before. To form those new neural connections and to really learn and understand.

Navneet and Michael, who oversee the program, have also been very supportive and have honestly become some of my best friends at the university. They have been there to assist me in the program and have offered me a lot of advice regarding my education, career, and sometimes even personal life.

I have worked in the SLG program for about three years. I started out as a leader who was a bit stubborn, and I didn’t really understand the changes I needed to make to optimize the SLG experience for the students attending my sessions. It took a lot of work from the staff, mentors and myself to get to a place where my sessions were effective and helpful in the way SLG is supposed to be. The sessions we hold as leaders are not just about getting students to pass the course we are assisting, they are about getting students to develop important skills in learning so that they can carry them throughout their time in university and hopefully even to the workplace and their own lives. As I graduate, I am taking many skills with me, but most importantly I am taking good memories which have made my undergrad experience so much more worthwhile.

If you would like to know more about the SLG program, please visit www.ufv.ca/slg.

https://blogs.ufv.ca/tlc/2025/11/24/from-connection-to-confidence-how-slg-transformed-my-ufv-experience/

For more information, contact Michelle Andrus at TLCevents@ufv.ca

12/24/2025