By Ashley Wood/south news editor
Registration can be overwhelming for some students, making sure the classes they sign up for will count, and checking in with an adviser can seem tedious.
South Campus is trying a college work-study initiative during the registration period for spring to help ease students’ and advisors’ minds. Work-study students will get paid to be friendly faces for all the incoming and returning students.
South counseling director Jade Borne said advising and counseling needs help with the heavy influx of students during registration.
“We need help screening them because they go to different areas depending on what their needs are,” he said. “So what we’ve decided to do is hire some work-study students and to use our student ambassadors as greeters at the front door.”
The student ambassadors are the supplemental instruction tutors and will take over the work-study students positions when they have classes or something else, Borne said.
Borne said the idea is like the Apple Store, where people are greeted and directed to the proper area. South greeters will ask things such as whether the student has or needs to make an appointment, Borne said.
“The workers will ask ‘Hi, how can I help?’ And if a student says they are new, they will point them to the left to the first-time student section. If they say, ‘I need to register,’ they will point them to the lab where volunteer faculty will be to help with WebAdvisor,” he said.
Having greeters will give students another friendly student face to speak with, Borne said.
“What we have found with work-study students is that they tell the truth to others, and they believe them,” he said.
Borne said he hopes there is less confusion with registration and less fear to communicate going forward.
Student development vice president Larry Rideaux said one emphasis on South is customer service.
Rideaux said he recently went into an Apple Store where the greeters were all polite and uniform. They got customers where they needed to be, and that is the concept for registration.
“When you’re walking in and don’t really know what to do, it really helps for them to acknowledge what you’re here for, to make the process much more efficient and to not waste your time,” he said. “We’re really trying to engage the students from the first moment.”
The greatest thing about the concept, Rideaux said, is using students to reach other students.
South student ambassador Maria Soto said she thinks the concept will help the registration process become student-friendly and smoother overall.
“I know that it can be overwhelming when you don’t know where to go and who to talk to,” she said.
Soto said the ambassadors will be in uniforms and easy for students to find for questions they might have.
Counseling and advising will be open normal hours for students registering starting Nov. 15.
