Welcoming new students: More orientation

Right now, student life at ETH is revolving around one thing: the upcoming exams. While others are enjoying themselves on the ski slopes, the ETH libraries are full to bursting until late in the evenings, nervous students arriving for exams can be found on the Hönggerberg piazza at hourly intervals, and coffee consumption on the ETH campuses probably reaches record level towards the end of January.

It may not seem like it sometimes, but there is a life after exams. One weekend after the end of the exam session, on 17 February, the spring term begins. This always brings the welcome event for the new Master students, the so-called MoEBs (Masters without an ETH Bachelor). These students have to learn to understand the complex ETH system, get along in a new country and get used to the student life at ETH, all in a very short period of time.

Thinking back to the beginning of my own studies, my first steps at ETH were accompanied by a lot of insecurity. Barely after getting through the first-semester day (“Erstsemestrigentag”), where half of the events go too quickly and everything seems very impersonal, you’re already expected to attend your first lectures with professors happily explaining things in a way you’ve never been confronted with before. You look at the first series of exercises with horror, and although there are good tutors, there are hardly any older students who take you by the hand and show you that everything isn’t so terrible after all. Before you know it, you have to take the first-year exam. After that, thanks to a new batch of first-semester students, you’re glad you aren’t one of the most clueless people at ETH anymore. Nevertheless, you still feel lost within this huge system, at the latest when the time comes to specialise. Then you suddenly wonder what institutes and groups there are at your department and how you can get in touch with them.

In this state of feeling lost, it is hard for many to identify themselves with ETH. Despite a number of opportunities for social and scientific interaction, students hardly stay on the ETH premises after the day’s lectures are finished. We want to return as fast as possible to a familiar place where we can meet people we know. This is the reason why we never really feel like we belong, and why after graduating we don’t think of ETH as a home of many years, but rather remember it with the same kinds of feelings we have about our old primary schools. I think this is a pity, because a feeling of shared identity could be a massive benefit for the university itself as well as all its individual members.

An approach that I think would contribute much to the goal of identification with ETH would be to carry out two or three introduction days for new students instead of just one. On these days, students could get to know ETH, its departments, the student organisations and the city of Zurich in a more relaxed atmosphere. Instead of rushing from one info event to the next during one day, there would be enough time to really get to know the department and the important people and offices and to get an insight into the administrative processes. Instead of having to keep a constant lookout for familiar faces on the first-semester day, students could meet fellow first-semester and older students at casual social events held across the introduction days and make the contacts that they need so desperately during their studies. Many of the problems that students are currently confronted with during the course of their studies at ETH could be solved simply by giving them the opportunity to create contacts and break down the communication barriers between them and older students, professors and department offices.

This is not an entirely new idea. The VSETH has proposed concepts for multiple-day orientation events to the Executive Board on numerous occasions, but without success. The Department of Computer Science actually carried out such an event once: Wednesday to Friday at the start of the semester in 2008. The feedback from new students and the department administration was very positive and a continuation of the project was called for but never implemented. Maybe it is time now to make another attempt. ETH has much to gain: the sooner students are familiar with the university, the sooner they feel like they belong and make their own active contributions.

Naturally, the implementation of such a project would take a while and cost a lot of energy. Nevertheless, we could and should lay the foundations for future years today. There are plenty of inspiring examples in Switzerland and abroad: TU Delft carries out a whole orientation week called OWee, and the HSG also gives new students a week in which to get to know their field of studies and the university. It’s not as though ETH has to reach for the stars: carrying out two-day instead of one-day orientation events at a few departments would already be demanding for everyone involved and would allow the insights needed for further development of the project.

No matter whether this project is implemented soon or someday in the remote future, I hope the MoEB students arriving in spring will have an informative introduction day. I wish them lots of strength, stamina and success settling into the student life at ETH and hope that they will feel a part of it in some way. For – and I speak from personal experience – this feeling of belonging makes studying a fulfilling pursuit that gives you the courage to look beyond your horizon, lets you make the most of the opportunities that ETH offers, and finally gives you what you are here to get: an excellent education, not just in your field of study but in all aspects of life.