Prepping parents for post secondary education
Emma Horsley, Surrey, 778.782.8191; ehorsley@sfu.ca
Bratislav Mladenovic, Health Sciences, 778.782.5927; bma16@sfu.ca
Tara Black, Burnaby, 778.782.6754; tblack@sfu.ca
Carol Thorbes, PAMR, 778.782.3035; cthorbes@sfu.ca
The parents of new Simon Fraser University undergrads are getting as much of a grounding in the ABC’s of successful higher learning as their kids.
For the third consecutive year, student services at Simon Fraser University’s Surrey campus is hosting a free two-hour fall orientation session for the family members of new students freshly graduated from high school.
Campus director Joanne Curry will welcome attendees to the event, Thursday, Sept. 23, 6:15-8:15 p.m., which kicks off in room 2600 at Westminster Savings Credit Union Theatre. Jane Fee, associate dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, and staff in Career Services and Student Life will prep parents on how to support their teenager’s transition from high school to university.
They will also advise parents on supporting high school graduates’ career-making decisions and provide an overview of campus resources tailored to those needs.
The session will conclude with a panel discussion featuring upper year SFU students talking and fielding questions about their university experience at the Surrey campus.
Attendees can then check out an SFU information fair at the Dale B. Regehr Grand Hall, where they can talk to academic program advisors, faculty members and seasoned students.
Volunteers will be on hand to take attendees on campus tours at 5:30 p.m. before the presentations start and after the information fair at 7:45 p.m.
Emma Horsley is a co-organizer of the Surrey orientation session and an outreach and student engagement coordinator for the campus’ Tech One program. She says, “Parents at these sessions are looking for more resources to help their kids get the most out of a post-secondary education and many come with their kids.”
Although Student Services at the Burnaby campus doesn’t host a special orientation session for parents it does welcome them to campus tours and makes a wide variety of on-line information resources accessible to them.
These include a newsletter, which has 400 parent subscribers, an Ask SFU database with information geared to answering parental questions and an e-mail address to which parents can send questions.
Earlier this summer, for the second consecutive year, the Faculty of Health Sciences (FHS) independently held Living and Studying in Exponential Times, an orientation presentation for the parents of its 250 incoming undergrads from high school.
“Many of these parents are university or college educated,” says Bratislav Mladenovic, FHS undergraduate programs coordinator. “They are directly involved in helping their kids make the right academic choices to maximize their eligibility for promising career opportunities. We spend a couple of hours sharing information about the cognitive and vocational benefits of higher education and how to make academic and course scheduling choices that secure those benefits.”
Mladenovic says two thirds of attendees take advantage of an additional half hour workshop on using SFU’s Student Information System to register their kids in courses. They all express interest in staying connected to their kids’ higher education in the Faculty of Health Sciences by getting involved in volunteer opportunities, such as manning a booth at SFU open houses.
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Sabtenia Jakaza
This is good to keep the parents up to date with what their kids will be facing at SFU for them to provide parental guide.