University of Texas Austin - Cactus Yearbook (Austin, TX)

Page 30 text:

o ORIENTATION Getting to Know You These two orientees ' enthusiasm was typical for the 600-900 people in orientation ' s seven sessions. h, if they only knew what they % were getting into. This Fall, 9,783 people were admitted to The University as entering freshmen. So young. So innocent. So unaware of how unpredictable their relationship with The University would be. Having been expelled from the safe shelter of high school, they had made their first Real World decision. Faced with the prospect of immediate entry into the drudgery of the job market or four years of relative ease in academia, these people made the only sane, in- telligent choice. They came here. And for 5,064 freshmen-to-be, summer orientation was their first blind date with The University. The orientees arrived, usually on a Monday afternoon, in the lobby of Jester East, home for their 3 Vz day stay. Most had something to say about the dormitory and its cafeteria. I heard about the food in Jester, and what I heard was right, Najiyah Najieb of Houston said. Jester ' s not as bad as people say it is. People make it out to be some kind of dungeon, Kent Morrison of Austin said. Fact was, though, most of the people staying in Jester had little time to worry about the dorm when they were in the midst of a flurry of discussions, meetings and tours. John Ragle, orien- tation director, said the program had a variety of aims, including helping orientees learn their way around cam- pus. People do worry that they ' ll get lost and never find their way back to where they started, he said. The ses- sions also tried to familiarize orientees with academic requirements and available services. The main draw that brought many people to orientation was the chance to pre-register for classes. After taking placement tests for beginning classes, orientees mapped out a course schedule for their first semester at meetings with orientation advisers. I thought I was going to have to plan out my four years. I really did, Kimberly Faulkenberry of Lubbock said. I thought we were going to sit down, go over my four years, and make sure I had all these hours. And I was going, ' Oh my God! ' We got in there and did one semester, and I was going, ' Phew! ' Semester by semester, I think I can handle that. Throughout the orientation process, the OAs played a crucial role in helping future students adjust to The Universi- ty; they were the experienced veterans leading those young, innocent orientees through a collegiate jungle. As Ragle said, They really are the heart of the program. Chosen in the Fall of 1982, the student advisers had primary responsibility for running the sessions. For many of the freshmen-to-be, orientation was a first confirmation of whether they had made the right deci- sion in coming to The University. It ' s either this or manual labor, as one orientee explained. And most had dif- ferent expectations of what the highlight of their college careers would be. Making it to class on time, Faulkenberry said. Morrison said flatly, Graduation. Ah, if it were only that easy. Brian Zabcik 22 Orientation

Page 29 text:

The Ubiquitous Hackeysack Our Championship Baseball Season SUMMER Summer Calendar 21

Page 31 text:

of what tt m ers wow ,-Briu Campus tours, such as this one on the steps of Gregory Gymnasium, helped new students avoid the classic freshman symptom: constantly clutching a map. w $ v OA Jack Jackson discusses the Plan II honors program with an orientee. Midnight prowl was the most popular feature of orientation. Orientation 23