When students first set foot onto Central Connecticut’s campus to become Blue Devils, the New Student Programs office will now be the ones to greet them.

“The intent is to have an office that is responsible for coordinating all orientation programs for incoming freshman and incoming transfer students, and also for serving as a support to parents and families of those populations,” Director Maria Santilli said.

Though the New Student Programs office is small – it’s currently a “one-person office” that employs student workers – it does big things for incoming students, according to Santilli.

Whereas coordination previously fell onto various divisions in the Office of Student Affairs, the New Student Programs department will now take charge of orientation and the orientation leader program, as well as work on anything related to making new students feel at home.

It will also play a “larger role with [the Office of] Student Activities [and Leadership Development] in coordinating Weeks of Welcome and Family Day” and will provide support to new students’ parents and families, Santilli furthered.

Recruiting, selecting and training orientation leaders is a large part of what the New Student Programs office will do; Santilli and her two student orientation coordinators just selected about 50.

“We had a record number apply – about 85. It’s a huge leadership opportunity to serve as ambassadors to incoming freshmen,” Santilli said, adding that the process has become “more competitive” than in previous years.

The New Student Programs office will also continue making improvements to overnight orientations, something that is fairly new to CCSU’s orientation program.

“It really gives the students time to orient themselves to the campus. It gives them an opportunity to meet incoming students, student leaders and their advisors,” Santilli explained.

“At times, there are some students who may go to an orientation and are still shopping and are still deciding, ‘Is this the place for me?’ So that’s another reason that it’s very important that we really make our students feel welcome,” she went on.

Junior Madison Greenstein, a co-student orientation coordinator in the office, can attest to the significance of ensuring that new students are adjusted to the campus.

“Seeing those nervous faces in the morning [go to] happy, cheerful [and excited] by the end of the second day of our program, you just know you did this job. Just seeing those happy faces makes you strive even more,” Greenstein said.

Kassandra Fruin, also a student worker in the office, is of the same sentiment as well.

“I love working [at the New Student Programs office] because of helping incoming students and families. It’s so important for them to know how much our university cares about them and are excited to welcome them,” she said.

And keeping students at CCSU is at the core of what the New Student Programs office will do, Santilli said, because it will make them feel “encouraged that they made the right choice in coming to CCSU.”

“[Everything we do] really shows how this office will have a huge impact on [the] retention of our students. We wanna make sure that our students, from the get-go, feel connected to the campus,” Santilli stated. “I think the retention piece is a huge part of what this office does, as well as recruitment.”

Santilli knows this from personal experience. As an alum, she’s been working on aspects of orientation with Student Affairs and Student Activities for a while.

“Even though my role is brand new with this office, I worked with the whole orientation leader process for the past three years and planning and creating a couple years ago what the overnight [orientation] could look like,” Santilli said.

With her position in the New Student Programs office, Santilli hopes to do more as the department itself expands.

“It’s growing. We’re only a few months into this being its own office. Things will continue to get better throughout the next year or two,” she said. “It’s a lot of work, but it’s really exciting.”