New Stu­dent Lead­er­ship Retreat
BY ELISE MARIE KNABLE ’09

While many stud­ies show that stu­dent apa­thy is a much greater chal­lenge today than it ever was a gen­er­a­tion ago, Wes­ley Col­lege admin­is­tra­tors are tak­ing a proac­tive approach with incom­ing stu­dents to reverse the trend at Wes­ley Col­lege. What bet­ter place to start than with the class of 2013, the largest fresh­man class that has ever set foot on Wesley’s cam­pus. Ear­lier this year, the Office of Stu­dent Life enacted a pro­gram to encour­age new stu­dents to “take a big bite out of their col­lege expe­ri­ence” rather than just go through the motions of school. This took the form of a New Stu­dent Lead­er­ship Retreat at Camp Sag­i­naw in Oxford, Penn­syl­va­nia. While it was an optional pro­gram, the idea was to cre­ate enough buzz early on to make this an expe­ri­ence the stu­dents would not want to miss.

Mary-Alice Oze­choski, dean of stu­dents, explained that the Office of Stu­dent Life wanted for stu­dents to gain an under­stand­ing of the oppor­tu­ni­ties avail­able to them and learn how to get the most out of their col­lege expe­ri­ence. She noted that the model used at this retreat was one she had used at other schools in the past. “I found it to be a very effec­tive tool for increas­ing stu­dent par­tic­i­pa­tion in events, clubs and orga­ni­za­tions,” she said. Another poten­tial ben­e­fit, she pointed out, would be a gain in stu­dent reten­tion and over­all stu­dent sat­is­fac­tion with the College.

This Retreat gave first-year stu­dents a chance to get away and learn new things about them­selves as well as Wes­ley Col­lege. Designed to pro­vide insight into the impor­tance of being involved on cam­pus, the Retreat also helped stu­dents real­ize their poten­tial as lead­ers, empha­siz­ing that lead­er­ship skills are not only applic­a­ble to teams and cam­pus orga­ni­za­tions, but will also ben­e­fit them in innu­mer­able cir­cum­stances through­out life. Stu­dents learned “why lead­er­ship and involve­ment are so crit­i­cal to employ­ment and grad­u­ate school suc­cess,” Oze­choski explained.

In total, 110 fresh­men and 30 upper-class stu­dent lead­ers, such as the ori­en­ta­tion lead­ers, attended the Retreat. Oze­choski was pleased to see that stu­dent atten­dees found a way to “break out of their shell” and develop skills that she believes will help them nego­ti­ate a “com­plex world.” They gained valu­able prob­lem solv­ing, cre­ative think­ing, team­work and com­mu­ni­ca­tion skills and acquired the step­ping stones toward hav­ing a ben­e­fi­cial and pro­duc­tive Wes­ley expe­ri­ence over­all. As an ori­en­ta­tion leader who par­tic­i­pated in the Retreat, Wes­ley stu­dent Noelle Jacob enjoyed being a part of the process that helped the new stu­dents “real­ize what they’re capa­ble of being or doing on cam­pus and in their future.” Jacob found that she strength­ened her own indi­vid­ual lead­er­ship skills at the same time.

Oze­choski expressed her desires for all stu­dents at Wes­ley, espe­cially the new class of fresh­men, to con­tinue to chal­lenge them­selves, try new things and become a part of the Col­lege by find­ing their voice and help­ing Wes­ley to move for­ward. “I hope stu­dents under­stand that a small col­lege affords you every oppor­tu­nity to become involved in or out of the class­room,” she said.

On Fam­ily Day on Octo­ber 24, all stu­dents who attended the Retreat were hon­ored at a cer­e­mony and recep­tion at the Wes­ley Chapel. This gave fam­i­lies an oppor­tu­nity to cel­e­brate their stu­dents’ involve­ment in the pro­gram, and it was another way for the Col­lege to reward the stu­dent par­tic­i­pants for their hard work at the Retreat and leave an impres­sion that they are impor­tant to the cam­pus com­mu­nity. Oze­choski com­mented, “I hope they [the stu­dents] appre­ci­ate that their tal­ents are unique and that we all ben­e­fit from those who are engaged in cam­pus life and then in the larger world.”

For the 140 stu­dents who attended, the impor­tant skills they learned will serve them well through­out their Wes­ley Col­lege careers and well into their future lives. For some of the upper­class­men like Jacob, par­tic­i­pat­ing in the pro­gram rein­forced the self-fulfillment of being in stu­dent lead­er­ship roles on cam­pus and how that is per­ceived by other mem­bers of the cam­pus com­mu­nity. “Attend­ing the New Stu­dent Lead­er­ship Retreat ben­e­fited my future by show­ing indi­vid­u­als I care about being a leader and that I enjoy hav­ing a pos­i­tive impact on oth­ers,” she said. For all the par­tic­i­pants, the friend­ships they formed will be another last­ing effect of the expe­ri­ence. The bonds and mem­o­ries made at Camp Sag­i­naw will always be part of their Wes­ley story.