12 Tips to Support First Year Students on Your Campus
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12 Tips to Support First Year Students on Your Campus
There’s no denying it. Freshman year is hard.
The transition between a regimented, organized senior year of high school (living at home and learning in a structured environment) to the first year of college (where built-in frameworks may no longer exist) can be an enormous challenge for many people.
From geographic moves, unfamiliar faces, new living situations, and unexpected social and academic expectations, it can be pretty intimidating for first-year students trying their best to adapt. It’s no wonder that far more students enroll as freshmen than walk across the graduation stage four years later.
Left to figure things out for themselves, first year students can have a harder time adjusting to their new environment and integrating into the campus community as active members. That said, higher education professionals hold the keys to unlock many useful strategies to help ease this transition and set students up for success.
Let’s take a look at some different ways universities are supporting and encouraging students to get involved and successfully navigate common challenges that arise in the first year of college!
1. Connect Students with Supportive Resources
To help set up first-year students for success, it’s imperative they know about all of the helpful resources around them - and how to access them. Offer open houses for different offices and departments on campus (especially those “scary” officers like Financial Aid, the Counseling Center and Career Services).
This allows students to explore those spaces and meet staff BEFORE needing to go. These visits can be held in office spaces, but sometimes it can be difficult to get students to go there, so having those departments set up tables in high traffic areas on campus can be an approachable introduction.
Another option is to host a big resource fair early in the semester, whether in-person, virtual or a remote-inclusive blended event. (The second week of school can be ideal, as the first week is pretty hectic for most folks!)
Invite all the different campus offices to set up booths to let students know how their office can help them navigate challenges and reach their goals. This spreads the love beyond just first-year and new transfer students, but will still benefit these and other at-risk students. (Consider offering specialized support to first-year students who are also First Generation or International students who are handling multiple transitions.)
Tip: Set up a meeting scheduling tool to help make it easy for students to search a ‘marketplace’ of resources to connect to the appropriate person and book a timeslot to meet with them.
2. Enhance Onboarding Programming
Start engaging new students early on by connecting them with important resources, information, staff, faculty and student ambassadors well before they set foot on campus. Introduce students to a dedicated advisor they can reach out to with questions and concerns. This goes a long way to helping an anxious student feel supported!
For first-year students, an onboarding process that includes virtual and in-person elements is a great opportunity to continually learn all about campus services and academic expectations. Onboarding events such as Meet & Greets, Scavenger Hunts and Game Nights also help them to start developing strong bonds with members of the campus community.
3. Support Students’ Financial Needs
Be proactive about financial assistance and promoting financial literacy. Keep students informed about scholarships and on-campus jobs by centralizing opportunities in one easily accessible place.
A campus job board makes it easy for students to browse all available professional opportunities. Offer emergency financial aid and assistance with critical needs such as housing, transportation, childcare and food pantry programs.
Instill a sense of financial confidence by providing opportunities for first-year students to engage in financial literacy conversations, classes or trainings. Introducing them to those concepts early on will have enormous long-term impact!
Join the club! getting active & involved on campus helps cultivate a sense of belonging and accountability among first year students
4. Get Involved in Clubs & Participate in Events Early On
Encourage students to participate in campus activities and join interest groups! This is a great way to help first-year students feel welcome and develop a sense of belonging in the campus community.
Inspire them to find ways to get involved: join a club, participate in student government or media, and attend on-campus events! Students will meet and build new lifelong connections with other like-minded classmates.
Make it easy for new students to browse involvement opportunities by centralizing and listing student organizations and events in a centralized engagement platform that they can access any time. Invite student leaders to host booths during student involvement fairs at the beginning of each semester.
5. Build Support Systems
Not every first year student has built-in knowledge on navigating the challenges of colleges (especially first gen students), and they may be unsure who to turn to for support.
Here are some useful strategies to connect first-year students with supportive influencers in their network:
Encourage students to make use of Office Hours for help with assignments or open-ended discussions (TIP: First-year students might be intimidated to demand resources, so it can be helpful to remind faculty members and TAs to be approachable and frame their office hours as a fun, welcoming and inclusive space!)
Connect first-years with upperclassmen and student ambassadors in a matching program. Upperclassmen can offer first-hand advice based on their own shared experiences, and new students may feel more comfortable approaching peers with questions and insecurities than they might be with staff.
Include parents and family members as partners in the path to student success. Offer workshops to communicate ways they can identify when a student is struggling and how they can help them.
Institute a Take Your Professor to Lunch program to strengthen communication and bonds between faculty and new students.
Integrate collaborative co-curricular activities into coursework.
Invite first-year students to share peer-to-peer knowledge and advice by having them write letters to next year’s new cohort at the end of the school year.
Help First-Year College Students feel supported and heard by gathering feedback regularly
6. Give Frequent Feedback
First-year students are coming from many different learning backgrounds and may not yet understand how to approach this new educational environment, the best ways to excel, or what’s expected of them. Instructors can guide students by being clear on end goals, how to reach them, and offering helpful feedback, early and often.
Without straightforward guidance, new students may feel isolated and alone and unsure what steps they should be taking. They may not realize they are at risk of falling behind or failing a course until a final grade comes out - this can be incredibly discouraging to experience. Prevent this potential roadblock by evaluating performance and communicating regularly.
Use data-informed proactive advising to measure success, identify struggling students and intervene at appropriate times. Knowing when they are falling behind, empowers students to ask for help before it’s too late!
7. Offer First-Year Experience Programs & Seminars
Help students succeed in their first year by providing innovative learning opportunities and coordinated support.
Create courses and programming such as a Freshman Seminar, workshops on common intellectual experiences and diversity/global learning, peer mentoring, first year advising, faculty development programs, and other environments that bring small groups of students together with faculty or staff on a regular basis.
Facilitate academic and residential learning communities! Being part of a cohort encourages integration of learning across courses, allows students to work closely with one another and their professors, instills a sense of belonging, and emboldens more reticent students to speak up and share their questions and ideas.
Another Offer pre-enrollment bridge coursework or bootcamps to help prepare students for success in their first year classes.
8. Connect Career Planning Resources
What is the main goal of any college student? To prepare themselves for a successful and fulfilling career! It’s critical, especially for first-year students, to understand the landscape of professional opportunities and the steps necessary to get there.
What does it take to get into grad school? Research, work experience, specific courses or co-curricular involvements? What internships will help build the best foundation in a specific industry or profession?
Advise students early on about growing job sectors, high demand skills and educational requirements related to their specific goals to help prepare them for graduate school or entry-level positions.
Tip: Tap into your alumni network to facilitate mentorship opportunities and mock interviews!
9. Remove Institutional Obstacles to Student Success
Break down those walls! This is especially important for underrepresented student populations. There are so many examples of areas in which roadblocks and hurdles can impede a student’s ability to succeed: academic registration/course availability and degree requirements, campus policies, financial aid, scholarships, student bills, academic leaves and more.
These challenges can not only be demoralizing but can deter students from degree completion. Evaluating and revamping campus policies and procedures to create fewer obstacles for students reduces frustration and attrition.
10. Train Campus Leaders
Before welcoming first-years, it’s super important to gather all staff members and faculty stakeholders of First Year Experience and Orientation and offer a training (or re-training) on supporting and understanding the incoming class profile and who this generation of students is. Be sure to also give Resident Advisors and student leaders specific training around the needs of first-year students, too!
As a customer service mindset reminder, be sure to remind them that even though this may be their millionth time repeating their information, it is that student or family member’s first time hearing it. Sometimes more seasoned staff and faculty can be quick to judge or gloss over information that is really important - so it’s critical for them to remember that even though it’s their millionth time, it’s Day 1 for the incoming students and their families!
11. Teach New Students How to Say “No”
From lectures and essays and heavy reading assignments to extracurricular, social and work obligations, first-year students may already be feeling overwhelmed. Accordingly, one of the most important lessons they can learn to set themselves up for success is simple: DON’T OVERLOAD YOURSELF.
Learning to manage your time and schedule does not come easy to many young students who are accustomed to being shepherded along in a highly structured K-12 learning environment. But suddenly they’re on their own.
Remind first-year students that it’s okay to say no when their plate is already full. Emphasize the importance of building in down time in their day for a balanced, healthy college experience.
12. Empower Students
Learning to navigate their new environment can cause some first-year students to feel out of control and uncertain. Assign and communicate clear responsibilities in which they can actively participate, such as joining a student organization or attending five on-campus events this semester. (Award points or badges for completion of required tasks to make mandatory obligations a fun challenge!)
Encourage professors to include student-centered learning in their syllabus and assignments. This will reinforce the idea that new students’ ideas are valuable and that they are an integral part of shaping their learning experience.
Supporting first-year students is a critical need to increase retention and graduation rates. Implementing the above methods, tried and tested by institutions around the world, equips new students with the knowledge and skills to take control of their education, navigate challenges effectively, and reach their full potential.
These small stepping stones campus leaders lay out will continue to guide students along in their future careers and for many years to come!
Ready to spark some inspiration? Reach out to learn more about using CampusGroups to support your student engagement goals. We’d love to hear from you!
