First year experience is a three-term program to help new students

Any first-year student will tell you that starting college can be an anxious- ridden endeavor. You’ve got an unfamiliar campus full of people you don’t know, there are rigorous schedules to juggle and financial needs to be met. It’s hard enough to keep up before it even gets started!

“I was scared at first, to start college,” says First Year Experience student, Jocelyn Maxey. “This class has taught me a lot of skills and now we’re in week eight. It’s still stressful, but if I need help I have support and resources available here.”

First Year Experience, based in Barlow room 240, is a three-term program that helps students put tools into their proverbial toolbox with which to help build their college success. FYE-101 helps students to form relationships with other students and faculty, learn about CCC’s many services and develop skills for stress and time management.FYE-102 supports students in creating an academic plan appropriate to their career goals, while FYE-103 is designed to help students prepare for their future, including test-taking skills and large project management, transferring to another school and searching for post-graduation employment.

However, being a newbie is not a requirement to enroll into FYE. “FYE works for any student,” says counseling department chair, Stephanie Schaefer, “because most of the topics we cover, like time management, especially stress management, are things most college students encounter.”

Heaven Gray-Lockhart recommends FYE to new students fresh from high school who want to go to college, but don’t know what the transition looks like. “It’s scary at first, but FYE is very helpful. Any questions you have about anything, this class can either answer it for you or the faculty can guide you to the answer.”

FYE will push students outside of their comfort zone to that place where life really begins. “I’ve had students who’ve been resistant to some assignments,” says instructor Jackie Curry. “They don’t understand the purpose of it, then they return to class and say, ‘Oh, I get why you made me do that. I joined a club because I had to do this assignment and I wouldn’t have otherwise.’”

David Green is a major proponent for FYE and his passion is evident.“This is a great, great course for students just coming back to school, or having trouble settling from high school into college; this class will help them get their skills developed and to move on. Our goal is to get them into upper-level college.”