Firsts Matter
September 22, 2014
By: Lisa Danca
College is one of the most defining chapters in a person’s life. Perhaps the best thing about college is that you can be the finest version of yourself and build a shiny new life. But shockingly, 1-in-3 first years don’t return for their sophomore year according to the US News and World Reports. There are various reasons first years drop out, but a chief one is loneliness. Fortunately, Salem State’s First Year Experience Office has made some major changes this year to prevent less issues because as Plato once said, “the beginning is the most important part of the work.”
The First Year Experience Office is a resource on campus that helps first-years successfully transition from high school to university life. They are in charge of FAB (First-Year Advisory Board), which hosts programs and makes recommendations to improve the first year at the university; the Student Success Series, programs that help students gain valuable skills to be more successful in the classroom and beyond; and Alpha Lambda Delta, the first-year honor society.
“‘First Matters’ is our new tagline,” says director Matthew Chetnik. “The tagline is based on John Gardner’s, Institute For Excellence In Undergraduate Education. Every first experience you have should be important, meaningful, and happy. So if you think back to your first kiss, the first time you rode a bike, the first date you went on, the first time you ate pizza- all of those things are memories and they matter in terms of your growth and development. So we’ve gone with ‘First Matters’ to help students think about how their first year in college matters.”
The First Year Experience Office, located in Meier Hall 101, doesn’t just work with students, they also collaborate with faculty. The biggest innovation that has been implanted is the first year seminar. All first years and transfers with fewer than fifteen credits are required to take a first year seminar. “First year seminars serve as launching pads for exploration and discovery, providing students with an opportunity to look at the world and specific issues and topics in a whole new way. These unique courses are focused on collaborative learning in an exciting environment. There are over fifty courses new students can take, including “a tarot card course taught by a political science professor and a yoga class instructed by a computer science professor.”
“I am taking Genocide and Holocaust Studies with Professor Mauriello,” says first-year, Jackie Saunders. “One main way this course is useful is that our professor tries to teach us skills like critical reading and writing without expecting us to know everything, which may happen in a course with mixed years. It is also great to have a class of all freshman so we can talk about what’s going on for us and have people to relate to that.”
“I wasn’t expecting my first year seminar to be amazing!” adds Jen Yao, who is taking Express Yourself: Dance To The Rhythm. “I love it because the teacher is really nice and nonjudgmental. He makes a comfortable atmosphere for us to be in. It’s a small class, around ten students, so we are really close. It feels like a family. Without my first year seminar, I think I would have a harder, less happy first semester.”
So before you decide to drop or transfer, be sure to see the First Year Experience Office. They are genuinely interested in the student body and are a firm believer in this quote from “South Park”- “there’s a time and place for everything and it’s called college.”
Contributor’s Note: Lisa Danca, Co-Editor-in-Chief of Red Skies is an English Major with a concentration in Professional Writing. When she is not writing articles for Red Skies, she enjoys reading young adullt fiction, watching beauty guru videos on YouTube, attending theatrical productions, and listening to her music obsession, The Beatles.