Summer 2006
O-Staff Craziness
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I would like to start off by saying, I love my orientation staff! This summer has been amazing because of my fourteen co-workers. First off, I will fill you in on how we all got to this point. Orientation is run out of the Office of Orientation and Student Retention. Students can start applying for orientation staff around March. There is an interview process and then students are notified if they were chosen in mid-April. This year there were over 70 students who applied for the position and 13 were chosen (two students have positions that last more than one year and were returning).
The training process was a bit grueling. For a four-week period, we trained Monday through Thursday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. During these training sessions, we had almost every office on campus come in and tell us their job at Canisius College. Now that training is over, I know everything I need to know about campus and the chairperson of every department. The best part is, now they even know who I am, which is great for networking. Also, for a two-day period, we had a crash course in acting. It was taught by two professional actors, who flew in from Georgia to teach us the skits we would be performing during orientation.
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Play Practice. Picture from left to right: Taryn Sobczak 09, Dan Aikin 08, Allie Schnackel 08, |
Not only do we all work together, we also live together on campus. Each one of us has our own apartment in the Village Town Houses. This is done because when students come to stay overnight for orientation, there is at least one staff member in each building. It also helps us bond as a group. Another way we bond is by having spirit week. During spirit week, each day had a theme. The picture below is from decade day, where I dressed up for the 70s.
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Katie Alfaro 08 & me |
Our first orientation session was June 29th and 30th. They were two of the most intense days of my life. I was up at 6 a.m. to set up for registration and the day lasted until 2 a.m. for bed checks in my building (it was a very long 20 hours!). It gets even better on day two! I woke up at 6 a.m. (after only four hours of sleep) and worked until 3 p.m. for our wrap up meeting. By the end of the session, I was ready to go to sleep for a whole day. Dont get me wrong, the session is very long and challenging but it is also a lot of fun. I loved meeting all the new students and their parents, while helping them become acquainted with Canisius. The summer is flying by and I am ready for the sessions we have in July!