Supporting, informing and integrating students in their first year.

1. Supporting, informing and integrating students in their first year. Daniel Ashall

2. We are asking students to become aware of, and accustomed to, A LOT!

3. Previous & current attempts • Performance in City Hall/Kings Hall • Not interactive • Costly • Not enjoyed- patronising (?) • Lectures • Given by many services (drain on resources?) • Putting a face to different services. • Plethora of services- can’t all be promoted through the lecture. • Students “afraid to look interested”, “don’t want to think about things going wrong”, • Not interactive. Opportunities and services for support not being heard.

4. ? Research strategy Remit: to consider a new, more strategic way, of communicating information about central services and opportunities available to students. Resources: student focus groups, staff in academic departments and central services, conferences (good practice in other institutions). Questions: • What and when? • How? • By Who?

5. Research highlights • What and when? • Induction not achieved in one event (students feeling lost, apathetic) • Just in time approach? (Cure over prevention?, What do we want students to be doing in their first year e.g. extra curricular activity?) • How? • Enabling social integration is vital, not just responsibility of Students’ Union(Field trips, away days). “get to know course mates and staff” • Engaging and contextualised- “how is this relevant to me?” and “How might it be”. • Accessing information needed to be simple. • By who? • To meet the dual requirements of: • An interactive, social introduction to services. • some method of clearly accessing information about different services in students own time. • The role of other students. • A central online resource for accessing information.

6. Recommendations (1) • Mentor-led induction events: • Providing the right conditions for the university mentoring project to work- building relationships in the first instance. • Opportunity for social integration- suits those who don’t enjoy “Freshers Week”. • Campus tour- orienteering • Activity days • “Uni-cycle”… • The authority of more experienced students. • Effective training to fill gaps in knowledge, promoting right messages (e.g. not being dismissive of services).

7. Recommendations (2) • Developing and trialling ‘Uni-cycle’: • From MMU’s “Staying the Course” • Contextualises information- raises awareness. • Social dimension • Gentle introduction to appropriate “ways of being a student”- services for when things go wrong and opportunities to make the most of experience. • Currently being trialled across faculties within Combined Honours, Biomedical Sciences and Computing.

8. Recommendations (3) • A student-written, central authority website: • A “one stop shop” for students to access from pre-induction and throughout the rest of their degrees. • Current pre-arrival site- not inviting/interactive and student homepage confusing with broken links- largely accessed for blackboard and email. • Main elements: • Student testimonials • Talking heads from staff • Direct links and specifc details • Simple easy to digest info: Who? What? Where? When?

9. Conclusion: highlights and other things to consider. • Current attempts to promote services are manifold but a more cohesive, considered approach is needed. • Information needs to be specific and contextualised- the game & role of mentors. • Social induction should, ultimately, be central. • Reflecting different needs- opportunity to find out information at any point- the website. • Question: Does this meet the requirements of ALL students? • Personal tutoring? • Social Media? App? • Induction/Re-induction for other stages?