-By Marinagrazia Bisogno-
A new academic year has begun and this time MS&PC has once again been doing his best to greet and welcome newcomers and offer them the support to deal with their new experience at MIT!
We have participated in the Orientation 2016 with a double date, two events organized by our staff together with our tireless team of volunteers, “The Learning Fair” and “The Campus Tour”!
We know that starting a new journey is not easy! Each of us has once been a newcomer, so we understand what it means to arrive in a place for the first time, feeling confused and overwhelmed because everything is new and unfamiliar and not knowing where to start. S&P can be a great help for newcomers to figure out which resources are available and ready to use, or learn how to find their way around the maze of campus streets, buildings and offices.
The Learning Fair, now in its 3rd edition, is an “open-house” event, created to build connections between newcomers and the different organizations that offer their programs at MIT and in the local community. The many partners were invited and they offered educational material, info and answers to questions about their various classes: language, photography, ceramics, cooking and much more.
Our events and activities are always created to support those who arrive at MIT to become part of our community, and in this light, the Learning Fair is a good way to learn about what the community can offer, and how you can make your stay here a starting point for new interesting experiences!
We also thought it would be nice way to find a good way to help new community members explore the campus and learn where to find this or that office, the library, the facilities, transportation and lots of other info that can be very useful for everyday life at MIT. The answer was our (stroller friendly) Campus Tour!
It was a great opportunity for newcomers to get to know each other and to experience how the campus is structured, finding the most important offices, the libraries, or getting updated information about news, shuttles, maps and emergency numbers, and for parents it was useful to learn pathways for strollers and places for kids.
We spent a very pleasant time together, and it was a lot of fun for us showing the campus to our new members, we were modern Ciceros for a day! Our team did its best to make sure that everything worked perfectly and to help newcomers find useful information to start their journey here.
None of what we did would have been possible without all our volunteers. This is what makes Spouses & Partners a big family where everyone contributes to achieve our projects; we know that strength lies in unity!
The Orientation is now over but MS&PC never stops! We are always at work, thinking about the ways we can improve our activities and build connections between people of our community, it is our mission but most of all our passion.
Looking forward to the next year’s Orientation, we wish to all newcomers good luck with their journey!
