Orientation aims to ease transitions

By Rosette Gonzales
DAILY BRUIN CONTRIBUTOR
[email protected]

  UCLA Student Media

Orientation staff members check in new Bruins on the
session’s first day last year. Students receive a stack of
guides and enrollment information.

As some students leave UCLA as graduates, others are just
beginning their lives as Bruins.

The UCLA Orientation program will begin its series of
orientation sessions July 8, for both entering first-years and
transfer students.

It’s an exciting time for most students as they are
introduced into the UCLA community and for some, college, for the
first time.

However, orientation, and the introduction to UCLA in general,
can be a bit overwhelming at first.

Sessions for first-year students last a total of three days,
from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. each day, including a two-night stay at
Sproul Hall. Transfer students endure an intense one-day-long
session from 7:30 a.m. to 9 p.m.

During each session, students will have the opportunity to meet
with a peer counselor to discuss their academic coursework, learn
how to navigate URSA in order to enroll in classes, and meet other
students who will be their peers at UCLA.

Roxanne Neal, director of UCLA’s orientation program, said
for most freshmen, this is their first exposure to college, whereas
transfer students are already familiar with making the transition
to a college environment.

Also, for most first-year students, orientation is the first
exposure to what it will be like to live away from home.

“For many students … it’s their first time away
from their parents, whether out of state or not,” said Nichol
Davis, a recent graduate and current orientation counselor.

Students can be “a little anxious,” Davis said, but
each student will have enough time with a counselor and activities
like the scavenger hunt “Carpe Noctem” to help release
the stress of choosing fall classes and dealing with URSA, she
added.

First-year sessions include a presentation on sexual health,
substance and alcohol abuse and acquaintance rape. According to
Neal, these topics used to be covered in the transfer sessions but
the program found that “most of (transfer) students have been
exposed to these issues before coming to UCLA.”

Besides discussing sex, drugs and alcohol, the freshmen students
get to participate in “Carpe Noctem,” watch the staff
put on a variety show for them called “Cabaret,” and
learn UCLA’s spirited 8-clap.

Transfer students do not participate in these activities during
their orientation sessions.

According to Brian Chan, a peer counselor and third-year
computer science and engineering student, transfer sessions take on
a more academic focus at evaluating coursework.

First-year sessions are more of an introduction to how college
works whereas “transfers are more concerned with what they
need to graduate,” Chan said.

Emily Walsworth, a recent biochemistry graduate who entered as a
transfer, described her experience at orientation as “heavy
and fast-paced” and said meeting with a counselor and
choosing classes were the only reasons for attending.

“They gave you a meal at the dorms but I was running
around so much, I didn’t have time to eat dinner,” said
Walsworth.

Sahba Tafazoli, a business economics and international
development studies graduate, remembered learning how to use URSA
as a freshman when it was only available over the phone.

Students shared the frustration of trying to enroll when many
courses had already been filled.

“It was the struggle which formed a lot of my friendships
at the beginning,” said Tafazoli. “Orientation gave you
a feeling of being part of the school beforehand.”

He added that forming new friendships and exposure to diverse
backgrounds will be a constant experience throughout UCLA.

So even if the specific content of each orientation session
differs, when that first day of school comes, each new student will
realize what it means to be a Bruin.