Interviewing a Fresh Freshman

So for this blog post I interviewed my good friend and floor-mate Mike Noji. What follows is our conversation.

L: So Noji, would you please just let everyone out there know a little bit about yourself please.

M: No problem. My name is Mike Noji, I went to Shore Regional High School. I’m a freshman,

L: Obviously..

M: Haha, yeah. I’m majoring in biological science and I want to conduct my own research after grad school.

L: Well that’s pretty cool. so, how are you liking Rutgers after your first year here?

M: I love it here. sure the classes are hard, especially bio and chem, but I really enjoy all the people. 

L: Have you gotten involved with anything on campus?

M:Yeah, I was a dm captain this year and am currently applying to be an AD next year. I also participate in some of the intramural sports teams that are on our floor. 

L: Wow, that’s cool. So that main focus of this interview is more geared towards orientation so I’m gonna be asking you some questions pertaining to that. First off, how did you like orientation?

M: I thought orientation was pretty good overall. I had Roma as my OL and I thought she was very good. 

L: Now I know that you live in the same building as Roma so this question is somewhat biased, but do you feel that the added exposure to your OL after the summer was over added or retracted from the orientation experience.

M: I feel that it added to it. Looking back over orientation after I had met Roma made me realize the authenticity of the OLs and they’re real desire to want to help out us incoming freshmen. 

L: That’s nice. So besides Roma, what was your favorite part of orientation?

M: On the first night when we went back to the towers to sleep, me and a couple of my other friends that I had met stayed up later hanging out and me and this kid Ryan Kelly built bunkbeds out of our beds. Its funny because we ended up living in the same building too.

L: So I want you to think about this a little, but what do you think could be improved about orientation?

M: I don’t wanna say the heat because I know its summer in New Jersey and that weather can’t be controlled, so I’ll say the rushed nature of the events. It felt that we were hurried along from activity to activity and weren’t able to experience what I think we were supposed to out of each.

L: So would you have preferred less sessions with more talking time in between?

M: Yes, and no. While less sessions would have given us more time to discuss stuff, we would not have been exposed to all the things that may have helped us out when we got here. What I mean is that while we had a little exposure to a lot of things, that little bit may have been enough to help us out in certain situations when we got here in the fall.

L: So basically it comes down to a time issue which is one of the things that we find difficult about running orientation. So what else do you think could have been improved upon? Think specifically about things that you wish had been included in orientation now that you’re on campus.

M: I wish more of a focus had been placed upon the different places that I could go to on campus to get help with work.

L: Like the learning centers?

M: I guess so. There have been times this semester where I have wanted help on my work but have not known where to turn and I wish more emphasis had been placed upon that during orientation.

L: I gotcha. So anything else, maybe something more specific about the OLs?

M: You guys were always super excited, which was both good and bad. I know we should be getting excited for coming to Rutgers, but sometimes I was just really tired and was in no mood for a game. 

L: Well thank you very much sir, the interview’s over and I hope you have a good day. 

Going through this interview really opened my mind to some of the common issues incoming students had with orientation, but also exposed me to other ones that I was unaware of. I can say with some certainty that the heat associated with the sessions was mentioned by every one of my groups so to hear it again does not shock me. Something that did shock me was the lack of mention of the learning centers. I know personally, I would make it a point to at the least mention the learning center at Loree during my tours and many times, my students had additional questions after all of my information had been communicated to them. While speaking about the learning centers may slip the mind of OLs during the summer, I believe it is crucial that we mention them even in passing so that the students have some mention of them during orientation. Another comment that got me thinking was admission to occasionally wanting more time for himself instead of constantly being encourage by the OLs to be as active and friendly as possible. Orientation is about getting students ready and excited for coming to Rutgers, and I feel sometimes that an emphasis is placed on being super animated while one does this. What is important to realize, and what I hope most people have learned from this class, is that an individual’s methods of leadership are not better or worse than another’s, they are only different. Every person has a different way in which they will lead their groups and it is our responsibility not to value one person’s way of leading over another person’s just because they are louder and more visible to the students. Our job is not to be loudest, but rather the most helpful. We should strive before anything to get the students prepared to come to Rutgers and realize there is not one “correct” way to do this.