The energy and excitement that come along with move-in weekend – new and returning students taking over State College again, youthful crowds in stores, restaurants and walking downtown, dorms and apartments full after our quiet summer – are palpable. It’s a new academic year.
For staff and faculty at Penn State, the ‘new’ year brings with it a new crop of students in our offices, in advising and, most importantly, in our classes. This year, I find myself looking forward to a new assignment. I have been assigned to teach the First Year Seminar (FYS).
Sometimes called the Freshmen Seminar, the purpose of the FYS is to offer new students a formal learning opportunity to expose them to the necessary tools to help them be successful as undergraduate students. Some version of First Year Seminar is required for all new students at University Park and at some of the Commonwealth Campuses. Each program uses the First Year Seminar as a way to orient students to the university, to help students define their career interests but also potentially to recruit new students into our majors.
I’ve been thinking about this course all summer. I’ve looked at what my colleagues are doing in other programs; I’ve done some reading in the area of recruitment and retention; I’ve read the university materials that outline the purpose of the FYS.
What are some of the things that 17- to 18-year-olds should be told when they get to our campus?
First, we are going to do some bonding activities. University Park can be very intimidating because of its size and the number of young people living in a relatively small land mass. I figure that if I can help establish a connection among the 20 kids in my class, it will provide them with another social network on which to build friendships and a ‘safety net’ to help them adjust. They will grumble about the games and social ‘assignments’ I am going to give them, but in the end they will know just a few more kids a little better. One more network can’t hurt.
Next, we are going to cover the university ‘stuff’ students need to know about their graduation plan. For example, how to use eLion – the system that gives them access to all of their information including tuition and bills, GPA prediction and, most importantly, their academic audit.
The audit is like an academic GPS for the Penn State student. What courses do you need to take? How many drop credits have you used? Are you meeting graduation requirements? I have had seniors come in to ask about graduation, and they don’t know how to read their audit.
We will also cover ANGEL, the online course management system used almost universally by faculty. Each course is posted on ANGEL, and then students check the syllabus, review the course calendar, upload papers and assignments, track their course grades, chat in work groups, etc. I’ve seen the puzzled look on the faces of kids who have not been taught how to use ANGEL and have observed first-hand how that lack of understanding negatively impacts their academic work.
We’ll talk about the good, the bad and the ugly of technology. (Internet research – good. Texting during class – bad. Drunk pictures on Facebook – ugly. Cheating while doing Internet research – really ugly.)
We are going to spend some time talking about services on the campus. We’ll talk about that big building that has a lot of books and other resources. It’s called the library. We’ll talk about University Health Services, the Office of Disability Services, The Office of Students and Families, and the Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). We’ll talk about where students can reach out for help.
Although we don’t have an honor code at Penn State, we do have a Code of Conduct. We’ll talk about police services, Student Affairs and Judicial Affairs. We’ll talk about how decisions both on and off campus can have an impact on success at Penn State. We’ll talk about drunk home invasions, public urination, and date-rape drugs. We’ll talk about the link to alcohol abuse in adolescence and alcoholism as a life-long struggle.
We will spend a lot of time on academic integrity. We’ll talk about the dangers of cutting and pasting, sending or receiving a paper from a friend, not citing sources, and so forth. I’ll walk them through the process of what happens – and it happens every semester – when a faculty member finds a student who took a shortcut. I’ll share with them how scary it is to go before a college academic integrity committee and how Judicial Affairs doesn’t take cheating lightly.
I’ll answer questions about majors. I will share with them the classes that have been favorites for other students. I will try to help them with their fears of math and statistics courses. I’ll try to persuade them that a career in the Recreation, Park and Tourism major does not always mean being a park ranger and can open up the world of sports, resorts, travel, event planning and other ‘people interaction’ fields.
We might go to the Berkey Creamery, downtown for a grilled sticky and do the Penn State tour. We’ll talk about diversity, tolerance and the correlation between attending class and academic success. I will encourage them to try not calling home every hour and to branch out from their high school friends. I’ll remind them to take care of their bodies with good eating and sleeping (and recreation) habits so that they are in the right condition to learn.
Hopefully, some of the information will stick.
People have questioned the need for the First Year Seminar. Do we really need a class, for credit, to cover all of these administrative issues? I say bring it on. We can’t expect our new neighbors to just know how to be Penn State students.
