Summary on Spring '10 Orientation

It was quite an experience having to serve as an International Peer Adviser (IPA) for this Spring semester. As IPAs, our roles were to provide as much help possible to the new international students, whether transfers or exchange students. We assist in many ways where we're capable of: help them moving into their residence halls, check-in and registrations, administrative requirements, payments, and also to help them to feel 'at home' in this totally new environment.

I was the Group Leader for the Red Group, together with Yin Feng from China. In my group, there were students from all over Asian and African countries. All of them are undergrad students. Me being me, I messed up with newbies from the other groups too! I found out that some of the Korean girls will be taking the same acting class with me in this semester.

So, basically we are helping them to get themselves familiarized with this new land. We brought them for campus tours as well as tours to Downtown and the other St. Cloud areas. It was fun to see their exciting faces for awhile. Most of them came from big cities, hence, just like what I've experienced, felt disappointed after getting to know this small suburban place.

There are 6 Malaysian students that came in this semester, 2 girls and 4 guys. One of the girls is an exchange student and one of the guys is a grad student.

I'm glad I made this decision to join the IPA team. Not only that I got to know many freshies but the CIS (Center for International Studies) staffs pretty well too. I also had closer bonds with some of the IPAs, namely the China students. They are indeed a bunch of crazy people to party with too~!

So, even though there isn't any paychecks, all I've earned is a bunch of new friends and a fruitful way to end my winter break.

Have fun in the first day of class everyone!