Trent University’s Office of Student Affairs (OSA) is two months into a new peer support program aimed at providing new students with a broader network of assistance as they begin their university careers. The program, which is largely college-run, was expanded from last year’s Peer Mentoring pilot program in Champlain College to become campus wide.
“The peer support program was started as a way to develop a connection between new students and upper-year leaders,” explains Sako Khederlarian, the OSA’s orientation coordinator. “The leaders [are] be able to answer questions, remind students of important academic deadlines, as well as lead workshops such as conflict resolution and time-management.”
According to the OSA, the program has so far generated an overwhelming response among the student community with 150 peer-support leaders being selected from a pool of more than 180 applicants. Associate Vice-President Students Nona Robinson said the program has been a demonstration of the willingness and commitment of the undergraduate population to see new students succeed at Trent. “What [the success of this program] says to me is that students at this university are extremely engaged. There is a culture of students supporting each other. There is a culture of students solving problems.”
The Peer-Support Program is run primarily at the college level which allows each college the freedom to structure their peer support activities in a slightly different ways. For example, “one college has a pair of partners leading a group of 30 students, another college has a group of 5 leaders with up to 50 students,” said Khederlarian.
According to Robinson, the Peer-Support Program is meant to work in conjunction with other college-based support systems like cabinets and dons to provide a broad network of support for new students.
She explained that integrating the program within the college framework was both deliberate and crucial because the colleges are meant to be the primary academic and social nexus for new students.
For the administration, another goal of the program is to improve Trent’s traditionally low retention rates. Student retention, especially new student retention, has been a well-known area of concern for the university administration over the last decade, and in recent years administrators have sought to combat this trend with the introduction of orientation programs such as Bring it On and the summer New Student Orientation (NSO) sessions. Robinson hopes that this peer support program will provide yet another way for new students to get the necessary academic and social support so that more will choose to remain at Trent.
Moving forward, Khederlarian says that the program will continue to be refined so as to better meet the needs and expectations of students. He noted that attempts will be made to connect new students with peer-support leaders earlier in the summer, further integrate the program into Introductory Seminar Week and NSO planning, and improve student attendance in workshops and activities.