Recent high school graduates: Stay connected
From November 2 to December 18, the UM is launching an innovative telephone support program for students who have recently graduated from high school. Its name: Connect: First Contact. Its mission: to listen to, inform, and guide students, and then identify any challenges they might face. Why is it innovative? Because it is based on peer-to-peer relationships. Its success was already evident just ten days after it launched.
Due to the health crisis, the 2020 edition of JANE, the New Student Orientation Day, could not take place this year. However, there was no question of leaving UM’s 5,387 new high school graduates on their own during this challenging transition from high school to university. In this context, and drawing inspiration from an initiative launched at the University of Sherbrooke, a partner of UM, the Student Life Office—part of the Campus Life Division—and Alexis Vandeventer, Student Vice President, devised a concept that is both original and unprecedented in France: the Connect telephone support service, run by students, for students. “ We thought these young students would find it easier to talk to their peers than to staff members “explains Jérémy Estèves, head of student life.”
Forty students from various departments—seven in this pilot version—were therefore recruited. Their mission: to contact, one-on-one, recent high school graduates enrolled in the same programs as themselves, in order to first assess their knowledge of student services and campus life and thus address any information gaps that arise. The second objective—a major priority in the current situation—is to identify students facing difficult financial, social, or psychological circumstances in order to better refer them to the appropriate services, such as the Handiversité service or preventive health services, or to apply to the Solidarity and Student Initiative Development Fund for financial assistance…
A comprehensive questionnaire
“Students have received training to help them feel more comfortable with this process, and it was very important to us that only law students, for example, reach out to recent high school graduates enrolled in law school, because they will be better equipped and feel more qualified to offer practical advice,” explains Jérémy Estèves. To better guide them throughout these calls, the student life office developed a comprehensive six-point questionnaire. First, a section on academic orientation, aimed at assessing the student’s mindset and motivation. Was their enrollment a first or second choice? Are they satisfied with it? Next, daily life, where issues such as housing, financial resources, health, or disabilities can be addressed.
Information about services—beyond the SUAPS or medical services, which are generally well known to recent high school graduates—comes in third.“It’s sometimes important to remind them that they have access to all facilities, not just those on their respective campuses,” explains Jérémy Estèves. Next come the communication channels students prefer to use to interact with the university, their current concerns—generally centered around COVID-19 and lockdown—and, finally, their assessment of the Connect system.
"Very positive" feedback
“After ten days of operation and 2,312 calls made, the initial results‘are very positive,’ the manager reports with satisfaction. As for the recent high school graduates, many of them expressed their‘pleasure at knowing that the University cares about its students’ well-being,’ Jérémy Estèves continues. “None of them expressed any negative feedback.” The students recruited to make the callsareequally satisfied.“They are very committed, and we assist them with issues involving sensitive topics such as housing difficulties or disabilities. All of this proves to us that this initiative truly meets a need. "The Student Life Office is already planning to repeat the initiative next year, in addition to the highly anticipated return of JANE."