Move-In Day Advice
In this Issue:
- Soccer Fan Fest (8/6)
- An outstanding article about our Leadership and Character program
- Some general advice for new student move-in day (8/23) and meals, plus move-in messages from the Office of Residence Life and Housing
For those of you who (like me) are trying to stay up to date on all the World Cup action, we have good news to you about soccer closer to home with our own teams. While we will be sharing a Move-In Guide a little closer to move-in day for new students, today we want to share some ideas on move-in mindset (for Continuing students – i.e., sophomores-seniors – their move-in dates are here).
Soccer Fan Fest (8/6)
Wake Forest men’s and women’s soccer are hosting a Fan Fest on August 6 at 5 p.m. at Spry Stadium and we want you to be there! Enjoy a meet-and-greet with the teams, lawn games, giveaways, and more to kick off soccer season right. This is free, and if you or your Deacs are in town, you should go.
An outstanding article about our Leadership and Character program
One of my colleagues shared this excellent article about the Leadership and Character Program at Wake Forest. It appears in Living Well, the inaugural journal put out by the Coalition for Transformational Education.
The article provides some great explanation of how our Leadership and Character program works, as well as why it is so important. The temptation for me to quote large swaths is big, because the whole article is great. So here’s a longish excerpt:
“[Michael] Lamb argues that college is an important time to teach character since emerging adults are already experiencing existential angst and self-discovery. He and his colleague, Kenneth Townsend, run the Program for Leadership and Character at Wake Forest University, a multi-dimensional center of curricular and co-curricular activities, scholarship, training, and public engagement focused on creating leaders of good character in a range of disciplines and fields. While character education is not new (it was central to much American higher education in the past), Lamb, Townsend, and their team have revitalized a focus on character as they integrate it into leadership development, positing character as a catalyst for flourishing both within a person and for a community. With early funding from the Kern Family Foundation and a recent infusion of $30 million from the Lilly Endowment, Inc., the program is poised to grow into a national center on character education. To get there, it is focused on two key questions: Can character be taught? And if so, why aren’t we teaching it everywhere? …
Overall, Wake Forest’s Program for Leadership and Character is divided into three pillars that, taken together, create a prototype for how to teach, test, and scale character-based leadership. The student experience includes courses within both undergraduate and graduate schools, discussion groups focused on topics such as the “purpose of college” and the “role of friendship,” and creative programming that explores leadership and character through art, athletics, and religious life. Rounding this out are the Leadership and Character Scholars, an annual cohort of students from diverse racial and socioeconomic backgrounds who have exhibited leadership and character in high school and receive merit and need-based scholarships to participate in the program’s activities throughout their four years at Wake Forest.
The second pillar is the curriculum development work that is done in a series of workshops and trainings of varying intensity with faculty. This allows interested faculty in every school or department within the university to incorporate character into what they are teaching, in some instances redesigning courses, be they in communication or computer science. In many ways, this is the most transformative element of the program in that it puts character-based leadership in any domain, grounding it into the pedagogy.
The third component involves a research and assessment team tasked with evaluating the strategies that are used to promote character growth in the programming and courses. This involves continuously collecting data on student outcomes.”
You can read the whole article here (and I hope you will).
General Advice for New Student Move-In Day, plus move-in messages from the Office of Residence Life and Housing
Here are some tips to help make Move-In a more enjoyable process for all. This is by no means a comprehensive list – use only the parts that make sense for your family.
- Be patient – with hundreds of new students moving in on August 23rd, there could be times where you have to wait in line. It might be in the car driving to your student’s residence hall, at the Campus Services and Information Fair in the Sutton Center to pick up ID cards and keys, or even to get lunch. Know that you have all day to accomplish things, and don’t fret about a wait.
- Stay hydrated – bring your reusable water bottle and refill at the water stations available. If it is warm and sunny, you might get overheated. Please stay hydrated. Ask for help from any staff member if you feel unwell.
- Be diplomatic – you will most likely be meeting your student’s roommate and family sometime during Move-In. The students will have to navigate who gets which bed, who puts their things where, etc. It’s best to let the students decide these things. Parents and family members, this is time to take a neutral stance and let the students make the decisions.
- Understand your student may act a little differently – they might be excited, or nervous, or trying to put on a brave face with their new peers in an unfamiliar situation, or they may want to act independently in getting all the business of move-in taken care of. Every student handles the hustle and bustle of Move-In differently. Be there with a supportive hug when needed, and let the student have their distance when needed.
- Honor the Orientation schedule. There will be activities for students only, and activities for parents and family members only. When your students are scheduled to attend an activity with their advising group or their hall, let them do that. We expect students to attend all required activities. This is the students’ chance to bond, and also to begin separating from their family.
- Have fun whenever you can. Sure, it can be a grind to move in and deal with extra trips to Target or the grocery store and such, but this is the start of what we hope will be four of the best years of your student’s life. Celebrate. Be excited. Recall your own time at college (or during other experiences in your late teens) and how fun it was. You are making family memories now that will last a lifetime.
- Take pictures. This is a major milestone in your student’s journey to adulthood. Your student will want to remember this day, and so will you.
- Before you leave, tell your students that you love them, that you are proud of them, that they’ll do well, and that you trust them. This is the most important of all. Nothing makes it better like your family can make it better, and at the start of the new journey called college, your Deacs might really need to hear that you love them, value them, and know they are capable.
We’ve also been getting some questions about when parents and families should leave/how to handle dinner on August 23 and/or 24, and when families should leave.
- Dinner on the 23rd and/or 24th will depend in part on what your student wants to do. Some students feel very eager to start going to dinner with other students and building their friend group; others are exhausted after moving in and they don’t want to go out to a dinner off campus, preferring to grab a quick bite and take a nap until their next activity; other students want/need that time with their family members.
- I would say if you are going off campus for dinners, you may be happier with shorter meals with more casual fare (you are likely to be hot, tired, and a bit overwhelmed). Our upperclass families weighed in this summer about some of their favorite restaurants.
- When to leave Winston-Salem? All activities for families ends the evening of Thursday 8/24. So we encourage families to depart by Friday morning if possible. The sooner you head home, the sooner your student can begin bonding with hallmates and classmates. So I would advise not lingering. (As a mom, it pains me to say it. As an administrator, I know it’s the right call).
Finally, yesterday our new and transfer students received a message from the Office of Residence Life and Housing: