{"id":13163,"date":"2017-01-16T09:05:42","date_gmt":"2017-01-16T17:05:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/?p=13163"},"modified":"2017-01-16T09:05:53","modified_gmt":"2017-01-16T17:05:53","slug":"ask-me-stations-help-new-students-find-their-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/2017\/01\/16\/ask-me-stations-help-new-students-find-their-way\/","title":{"rendered":"Ask Me stations help new students find their way"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>When you think of new students starting at university, you typically think of starting in September. But a significant number of UFV students begin their studies in January.<\/p>\n

UFV wanted to make sure they felt welcome, so in addition to a small New Student Orientation held in November and aimed at helping guide them through registration, a group of departments and services offered Ask Me stations during the first week of classes.<\/p>\n

“There were close to 1,000 new students starting this semester, and they have all sorts of questions as they get settled in to UFV,” says Belinda Karsen, student transitions coordinator in Student Services.<\/p>\n

So peer leaders from the Peer Resource and Leadership Centre, Student Ambassadors, and Global Engagement Volunteers staffed four Ask Me booths around Abbotsford and Chilliwack campuses.<\/p>\n

“It was great because all these volunteers are trained already and it gave them a chance to use their skills and knowledge in a new setting,” says Karsen. “The whole idea of peer support is very useful because these students have been through being new at university quite recently themselves.”<\/p>\n

The Ask Me stations answered 500 questions.<\/p>\n

“This takes considerable pressure off of front-line staff at places such as OReg and the Library, which are generally pretty busy places in the first week,” says Karsen. “We don’t really have a central information desk at UFV so the Ask Me stations played that role.”<\/p>\n

The Ask Me stations were a joint initiative of Student Life, UFV International, and the Coast Capital Peer Resource and Leadership Centre.<\/p>\n

“I would like to thank Chelsey Laird and Ashley Hayes as well as our team of 46 dedicated student volunteers for their cooperation,” says Karsen. “It is my hope that the Ask Me stations will become a UFV tradition during the first week of classes each semester. They mitigate some of the pressure on UFV staff at high-traffic locations, but most importantly, they send a message to our students — new and returning — that they are part of a community that is ready to help them.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When you think of new students starting at university, you typically think of starting in September. But a significant number of UFV students begin their studies in January. UFV wanted to make sure they felt welcome, so in addition to a small New Student Orientation held in November and aimed at helping guide them through … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"generate_page_header":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13163"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13174,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13163\/revisions\/13174"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ufv.ca\/announce\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}