By Melis Ciner on January 7, 2009 5:10 PM
When prospective students ask me how I made friends and adjusted to Emerson, I tell them to attend orientation. I met most of my close friends at Emerson on the day of International Student Orientation (scheduled for January 14 for international students starting school in Spring 2009). From there, I met their close friends, and their friends' friends, until I had a pretty substantial social circle. Orientation for graduate students entering Emerson in Spring 2009 will happen on January 15. See the schedule for complete details. I definitely recommend attending!
When it comes to finding friends, having an on-campus job at Graduate Admission also helps a lot. Through my work in the office, I am to meet students in other programs and share in their experiences. Many people say that they found it difficult to adjust to graduate school; for some reason the community was not as readily available to them as it was in their workplace or in college life. I find this plausible, especially for part-time students who have to work full-time. Becoming engaged in a campus community when you have to devote most of your time to your career requires a lot of effort.
Added to this is the fact that Emerson does not have on-campus housing for graduate students. Hence, the immediate community that would develop around dorm life is not necessarily there. However, there are many other ways to become a part of the graduate community. Cathy Waters, Graduate Program Director of IMC, hosts regular coffee hours for students. Held right before class, coffee hours allow IMC-ers to share a cookie-induced sugar rush to get our gray cells going! We also have semesterly IMC symposia where a keynote speaker and student presenters update the community on trends in the field and in their professional lives.
If you ever need a break from your chosen field (it happens to the best of us), there are also plenty of events going on in other programs. For example, the other day I attended a performance by Julia, a coworker and close friend of mine. It was a series of wonderful end-of-semester plays by the graduate community in the Theatre Education program. Well-acted, thought-provoking and funny, the performances were echoes of lives that I may never experience except in a theater. It was great to see what my more artistic counterparts had been up to during the semester; I will definitely be attending the next installment.
So you never know where you'll find friends at Emerson—other than at Orientation!
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