Welcome to Staying Connected, an on-line blog/newsletter for parents of first-year students at Webster University.

 

By the time you are reading this, your son or daughter is in the process of starting his/her second semester at the University, as undergraduate classes resume on January 17. Can you believe that these months have gone by so quickly since the start of classes in August? I hope you were able to spend some nice time together over the holiday break.

 

Emergency and Weather Alerts

I am writing this on the last day of finals week, a day reserved in case we have snow days earlier in the week. Fortunately, we have had no snow days yet this academic year. Did you know that your student can sign up for our Webster Alerts program to receive text and/or email messages regarding weather-related campus closings? Webster Alerts is a campus alerts service that keeps students up-to-date on the latest campus information. Webster University has partnered with e2Campus to offer this service FREE to students, faculty, and staff. Using this service, Webster sends out text messages and/or emails containing emergency announcements and weather-related school closing information when necessary. Although optional, students are strongly encouraged to sign up for Webster Alerts. To sign up, students should go to this web page: http://www.webster.edu/technology/websteralerts/.

 

Impact of First-Year Students

First-year students have been making a strong impact on the Webster campus this year. Here are just a few highlights:

• Faculty in the learning communities have been telling me great things about the first-year students in their classes.
• Brittnee Bauman and Abby Hopkins were elected to senator positions in Student Government Association.
• Freshmen Creighton Chavez, Sara Graham, Kassandra Ochoa, and Jennifer Scanlon made contributions to the women’s cross country team, which claimed first place in the SLIAC conference for the first time in school history
• Freshmen Nathan Hitchcock and Jason Hickson contributed to the men’s cross country team
• Men’s soccer got contributions from freshmen Brian Woodward, Justin Peters, Cody Dupree, Jeff Wallner, Taylor Overstreet, Tyler Brown, Brelon Buckner, and Carlton Poindexter
• Women’s soccer got contributions from freshmen Jessica Davis, Kristin Montgomery, Kortney Luaders, Amy Schield, Whitney Scott, Michelle Scally, Lauren Scalise, and Melissa Collins
• Freshman Cassie Endicott is playing a lot of minutes for the women’s basketball team
• A trio of freshmen are contributing to the men’s basketball team – Danny Zehner, Lawrence Williams, and Ahmad Smith

 

Career Services

Has your son or daughter utilized the terrific services offered by our professional advisors in the Career Services department yet? If not, please encourage them to do so this semester. Some might think that the freshman year is too early to begin using Career Services. A few years back we had two consultants on campus, directors of the career centers at DePaul University and Arcadia University. One of the main themes of their report was that students do not start using Career Services early enough.

 

For freshman, the first year in college is the time to begin evaluating their values, interests, personality characteristics and skills, and identify how these relate to potential majors and careers.

• Enroll in core courses and identify academic areas and subjects that interest you.
• Sign up for a free My Career Connections (MCC) account through the Career Services website, http://www.webster.edu/careers/.  MCC is an online database that allows students to search for on and off-campus opportunities and keeps students up-to-date about Career Services events.
• Preview the student catalog and review courses.  Learn about the academic resources that are available to you at Webster University.
• Create a plan by establishing academic goals and objectives.
• Identify activities that you enjoy, and try to incorporate at least one of these into your academic and work life.
• Work in a part-time or volunteer position to gain career-related skills such as customer service and communication skills, organizational abilities, teamwork, etc.
• Participate in programs offered by the Career Services office to learn more about different career fields.
• Utilize resources in the library to explore career information.
• Talk with people working in careers of interest to you.
• Utilize SIGI³, an on-line system of career information, for additional skill and interest assessment, career exploration and job search planning; SIGI³ is available through the Career Services website.
• If you are still exploring academic and career options, schedule an appointment with the Career Services office for more information.

Students can contact the Career Services office by calling 314-968-6982 or 1-800-981-9805 and schedule an appointment to:

• Discuss individual career concerns related to choice of major, choice of career field or career transition.
• Arrange to take career assessments which may assist students in identifying their interests and help them to explore career options.
• Learn about resources which will help students to explore specific careers and obtain detailed information about job tasks, employment outlook, etc.

Happy New Year!

 

Sincerely,

Ted Hoef, Ph.D.
Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students
hoeftl@webster.edu