Attention new students: get ready to rule. This year’s Orientation Week theme – Generation W – is all about empowering first-year students and helping them make their marks on the world with Western’s support.
Matching shirts will be all the rage during O-Week as first-year students are welcomed to campus with a variety of activities throughout the week.
“There’s a whole new level of independence on their shoulders,” says Jeff Rajesky, orientation coordinator for 2009. “We wanted to make all the incoming first years feel important and proud of the university they’re attending.”
To help accomplish this, Orientation Week (or O-Week, as it’s more commonly referred to) will focus more on improving accessibility to events to help make more students feel welcome at every activity, Rajesky says.
The University Students’ Council even created an Accessibility Task Force for O-Week, which includes input from Student Disability Services, which brainstormed a number of ideas for how to improve accessibility during the week.
For example, wheelchair-accessible Porta-Potties will be available at this year’s events for the first time. Other ideas were to place wooden boards on the ground at outdoor events, especially at ones taking place on hills, and to have an accessibility station for students with extra needs to get more information, Rajesky says.
O-Week also aims to celebrate Western’s diverse cultures on campus, he adds.
There are often dance parties during the week and last year there was a block party, which included breakdancing and graffiti artists. Rajesky says he hopes to continue similar programs, which feature more diverse music, dancing and talents.
“We really are pushing for more diverse programming, not just the same dance party every night,” he says.
The largest university orientation week in Canada, Western’s event usually involves about 5,000 first-year students. Approximately 800 upper-year student volunteers, called ‘Sophs’, are selected each year and undergo three-day training sessions to help lead activities and introduce incoming students to the many aspects of university life.
Sophs and new students are divided into 21 constituencies, including the seven residences, seven faculties, three affiliated colleges and an off-campus team.
All of the events are alcohol-free, but it hasn’t stopped students from enjoying Orientation Week, Rajesky said.
“It definitely works out better this way,” he said. “It’s really important that first years have a good role model (to teach them) you don’t necessarily need to drink to have fun.”
There is also a 50-member information team to introduce students to Western’s services for health, safety, recreation and more. Two additional teams oversee Western’s two charitable events during O-Week: Shinerama and the Terry Fox Run.
This year, O-Week runs from Sept. 6 to 13.
In the past, activities have ranged from carnivals and concerts, to sports games and faculty programming. Many of these events will be part of this year’s orientation week, Rajesky says.
For example, Talk Sex with Sue Johanson, a sex therapist, is a popular event, he says. And students always watch a sports game, usually Mustangs football, he adds.
The week ends with Shinerama, a fundraiser for cystic fibrosis. Western students collect donations in exchange for performing music, shining shoes, washing cars and other services.
The last official O-Week activity is the Terry Fox Run. Incorporating two runs to raise money for cancer research, Western has one of the largest post-secondary runs for the cause.
And the Orientation Week schedule is so packed throughout the week that students have plenty of other activities to take up their time.
A typical day for students during O-Week usually includes an early morning. But the daytime is full of events aimed at letting students socialize with each other and their Sophs and get comfortable on campus, while the evenings are meant for such events as dance parties and guest speakers, Rajesky says.
“I’m super excited. People are saying I use the word too much but I don’t think so. It’s great to be excited about something like this.”