Hola Chicos,
Welcome back to school, Pointers! I hope everyone had a wonderful end to their summer and is starting off this school year on a positive note. I couldn’t be happier with how my summer ended and I am immensely looking forward to this semester. I have a lot in the works in semester, and most of it is happening in and around the College of Professional Studies. Most of my classes are economics courses to help me finish up my econ major. I love that I am really getting into the nitty gritty of studying economics and so far I love all of my classes. I also just submitted my application for an economics internship in London during the summer of 2015. I feel really confident with my application and I can’t wait to find out where I will be placed while in London. Finally, I am just starting out being a peer mentor for underclassmen business students. I think it’s a great program and I thought I would spread the word about it in this blog post.
The Student Mentor Program is a new program this year that is meant to bring new School of Business and Economics students with upperclassmen SBE students. The mission statement of the Student Mentor Program is: “This program seeks to foster caring relationships in order to provide insight and advice about student life and create a sense of belonging for new students.” Basically, this program is meant to help provide younger students with an older friend that has experienced the same obstacles and achievements that the younger students will be going through in the next years as an SBE student. New students are going through many changes at once and your mentor is there to talk to you about everything–student life, finding a job, your professional goals, anything–and to provide you with help personally or point you in the direction to someone who can. I know when I was a new SBE student I would have very much appreciated and enjoyed having a mentor to go to for advice on school and UW-Stevens Point in general.
Jesse Kosobucki, the SBE Student Mentor Program manager, says, “Your mentor should serve as a spring board, a shoulder to lean on, a friend–whatever you and your mentor choose to make it.” Each student is matched up with a mentor and then make their relationship whatever they want it to be. The mentor and student can just hang out, go out to eat, go adventure around Stevens Point, or whatever they want.
If you are interested in the program, whether that be as a student or as a mentor, contact Jesse Kosobucki (jesse.J.Kosobucki@uwsp.edu). Or just come to our matching session on Monday, Sept. 22 at 11:30 a.m. in CPS 210. The meeting should last no longer than an hour.
So I hope this post an interested at least someone in this new program. I know I can’t wait to help this program get off the ground and running. I hope to see some of you at the meeting on Monday, but no matter what I hope everyone has a good first month of school!
Hasta Luego,
Alexia
Alexia Szabo is a senior majoring in economics, Spanish and international studies at UW-Stevens Point.