Ep. 4 - Engaging You Virtually

Yoties! Welcome to Episode 3 of the CSUSB Advising Podcast! As we continue in the virtual environment, you may be asking what kind of engagement can you expect from CSUSB departments, especially what other academic colleges have to offer. We have 3 amazing guests to discuss just that:

• Ashley Watterson - Program Coordinator, Office of Orientation & First Year Experience
• Dr. Lisa Guzman - Director, College of Natural Sciences
• Nick Hall - Advisor, Health Professions Advising Center

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Transcript

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Star Wildes  
Welcome to the CSUSB advising podcast. Join us as we bring you the latest advising updates at Cal State San Bernardino. Each episode is specifically made for you the CSUSB students and parents. We provide you with advising tips, interviews and both CSUSB campus resources and those in academic advising, sit back and enjoy. Go Yoties.

Matt Markin  
Hey Yoties, welcome to episode three of the CSUSB Advising Podcast. I'm Matt Markin, and hey, it's Star Wildes. Hey Star, 

Star Wildes  
Hey Matt.

Matt Markin  
And it's September or almost midway through September. And yodes, if you're listening in, on September 14, we're now going to be in the fourth week of the semester. Time is flying. We hope everything is going well in this virtual environment. And just remember that Monday, September 21 is census date. Census is the last day to add or drop without record of enrollment, which means no W or withdrawal designation on your transcript. But there's some bigger news that has dropped, and Star has the latest.

Star Wildes  
Absolutely. Please check your emails for notification from the chancellor's office. There is a memo. New information about this upcoming spring 2021, term, please make sure you check your emails, check notifications and social media outlets for updated information.

Matt Markin  
And I would assume that more information will be forthcoming as well, based off this memo from the chancellor's office regarding spring semester and still being in a virtual environment. So please, like star said, continue to check your CSUSB email, as well as the CSUSB website for those latest updates. But let's dive right into our interviews. First up, we have Ashley Watterson from the Orientation and First Year Experience Office. So we thought it'd be great for you, yody, to hear about how orientation and first year experience, how they are a resource to you, and also some of the upcoming workshops for you to attend virtually. So here we go.

Matt Markin  
All right, we have Ashley Watterson, who is the first year experience coordinator at CSUSB, overseeing both first year experience programs and parent and family orientation, Ashley is responsible for supporting incoming students with their transition to CSUSB since joining in December 2018 with the support of the Chancellor's Transition Program Award, Ashley developed the I'm first Alliance initiative to support new first generation college students in their transition to the university Through collaborative programs, including support to first generation parent and family members. CSUSB serves over 80% first generation college students. Ashley has worked closely with the teaching resource center and general education faculty to present on first generation college student experiences and challenges, highlighting University lingo and jargon and the hidden curriculum. Ashley received her BA in Asian Pacific Studies and her MA in higher education administration from Loyola Marymount University. She's an aspiring PhD and plans to study positive organizational psychology in the future. Ashley, welcome to the podcast.

Ashley Watterson  
Hi. Thank you so much. I'm so excited to be joining the both of you.

Star Wildes  
So awesome, Ashley, and thank you so so much for joining us. I This is going to be great. So Ashley, can you tell us a little bit about what you do, and what does the orientation and First Year Experience Office do? 

Ashley Watterson  
So orientation and first year experience, of course, starts with orientation, so it is a required program for all incoming students once you go through orientation, we kind of hand you off to first year experience. So first year experience does support first year students and transfer students. So if you are new to CSUSB, it is your first year at CSUSB, then you qualify for first year experience. It really is our goal to support the transition of students, and we do this by trying to provide the foundational skills, providing you resources, opportunities for engagement, so that you can really lay the foundation for what all of your you know, time at CSUSB will be, and making sure that you have those skills and that you're prepared and feel empowered to, you know, reach out to The different resources and offices that we have on campus, and there are plenty. There's a lot to know. So we definitely try to spread it out throughout the year, try to meet students where they're at and not try to overwhelm them with a lot of information, especially in the beginning. So it is a year long program, and so students will be hearing from us throughout the entire academic year.

Matt Markin  
And I guess this kind of ties into it, because in your bio, you reference that CSUSB serves over 80% first gen college students. So whether it's first gen or first year students, what are some challenges that you found that some of these students face or experience? And I guess the follow up to that would be how. Does CSUSB or how does your office help with overcoming those challenges?

Ashley Watterson  
Sure, so I always have this saying when I when I was special, when I'm talking to faculty or staff and trying to talk about the first gen student experiences that you don't know, what you don't know, and I think that applies very specifically to first generation college students. And we define first generation college students as a student whose parents or guardians do not have a four year degree. So I think that's important to clarify. So even if your sibling went to a four year institution and graduated received their degree, we still base it off of your your parent and family members or your guardians. And I think this is important because you're going to have a different going to have a different experience trying to educate and help your families understand what you're experiencing, and that's going to be different from, you know, what you'll be dealing with, with your siblings. And so some of the challenges, I think, that's one of the biggest ones, is trying to help your families understand what you're experiencing and why you're doing the things that you're doing something in first year experience that we emphasize is it's college is more than just going to class. You have to find opportunities to engage, you know, opportunities to network with other people, because these are really the skills that you need post graduation. A lot of first year students think that, or a lot of students in general, think that degree equals career. And we know that this is really not true. For example, I have a degree in Asian and Pacific Studies with a minor in Chinese, but yet, you know, I'm working at a university, and so I was able to develop into the person that I am today because of the opportunities that I took advantage of when I was at school, networking, taking advantage of resources, meeting with peers, taking on leadership positions. These are all things that we want students to do in their first year so that they can really be set up for success. But sometimes our family members don't understand again, all of these pieces or they really want. And I know we work closely with advising to help students understand what do they want to major in. So I hear from a lot of first gen students that, you know, my parents want me to be a political science major because they want me to be a lawyer, or they want me to be a biology major so I can be a doctor. You could still be a philosophy major and still go to law school. So I think that's another reason why my office also does work with parent and family members, because we recognize that they may not always listen to students, and sometimes they want to hear from somebody like me as a professional staff that has that experience and is really giving them a big picture. And so we really like to support students in that way as well. I think it's really, really important that we can't leave our families outside of this transition, because, in reality, they're going through the transition with us as well. So I try to, you know, talk to students and families about that this is really a partnership that we have in their first year so that everybody can be on the same page and that, again, our first years are set up for success long term.

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much for that, Ashley, can you tell us a little bit more about how students can stay engaged during this time?

Ashley Watterson  
I think there's a couple of ways. The first one is that, of course, we will continue to offer offer virtual events throughout the year, or at least the semester. Hopefully we're back on campus in the spring, but we will continue to offer virtual events throughout the year, and so we really encourage students to still come out to those not only is it to give you information and do all the things that we were doing before, again, giving you the tools and resources to help you to be a better student, but also it's a great way to meet other students. And I know it may seem weird to do this in a virtual setting, but a lot of us are really trying to be intentional about finding ways to make our workshops engaging, giving you an opportunity to talk to other students. So I think this is a great way to stay connected to the institution, but also to peers. Of course, you're not getting that same type of connection that we would love for you to get during the year if we were in person, but I still think that you can do that in a virtual setting. So with that, we encourage you to be engaged, whether that's on the chat or, you know, having your camera showing so you can, you know, show who you are, whether that's what your room looks like, or if you have dogs, you never just connect, you know. You never know if you're going to connect about you having the same dog in your room, right? And maybe that's how you start the connection. So I think that's the first way. We're having a lot of zoom events. But there's also a lot, I think, still happening on Instagram. So check out any Instagram lives that are happening. Maybe you want to hop on. Maybe a department will invite a student to ask them questions live on Instagram, live, which I think is really cool. That's another great way. And then I think staying engaged with your faculty. I know it seems really hard, and this is something we really emphasize to students, is go to office hours or student hours. And this is really a time. Time that you have as a student to talk to your instructor about what's going on in the class, or just about what's going on with life. Your faculty is not just a person that is supposed to teach you what's in the you know, the content of the course, but they can really be a great asset to you. Can be a mentor to you, can be a letter of recommendation in the future. So don't miss an opportunity to develop and build that connection. So if you're looking for a job, I just had a student tell me that she's looking for a job. If she didn't tell me that, I would have never when a job opportunity comes up to me, I would have never thought to send it directly to her. But now that I know that information, she's going to be one of the first students, I email and say, hey, you know there's just job opportunity. I really think you should apply. Tapping into your mentors, tapping into your staff and faculty is another great way to be engaged. And don't be afraid to be engaged in the classroom. If you don't talk to each other, and if you don't share your experiences, you're also maybe taking the opportunity to educate others, and I think that's really important, and something we share within the first gen community is sharing your narrative, sharing your perspective, can be super valuable. You never know how that's gonna resonate with somebody, how that can impact somebody in a positive way. So don't be afraid to speak up in the classroom as well.

Matt Markin  
Excellent points, and especially, you know, turning on the camera. And I know some students might be a little nervous to turn on the camera, but just like you're saying, like, it could make a connection, because maybe have something in the background. I mean, mine right now, I have nothing showing in the background. But when I'm in my office, like, I have my Pop Funko figures or something, you know, or like, star right now has her plants, and so there might be some type of connection. There some network going on. And even the office hours for the instructors, they have office hours through zoom. So it's a great chance to connect and ask those questions that they might be confused about during the lecture, or something that they're reading through Blackboard, or wherever it might be that they're trying to learn. So it's like, take advantage of it because they offer and if you don't go, then can't get that that assistance. But I guess leading into that, what are some upcoming events that our students for Cal State, San Bernardino can attend during this fall semester.

Ashley Watterson  
So overall, I would say, please check your emails. I know we say this all the time, and I know it can be very overwhelming, but that really is our primary way of communicating with you right now, because we can't show you our all of our wonderful flyers in person, but check your emails, because there are tons of workshops and events happening all across the campus, some social, some more educational. Maybe it's tied to your class, so definitely check your emails for that. Our next event coming up is in collaboration with our Counseling and Psychological Services, also known as caps. You might know them as that as well, and so we're going to be focusing on how to manage and cope with the stress and anxiety that you may be experiencing as a first year student or just in general. We know and recognize that the time that we're living in right now is extremely challenging, even for us as professional staff, it's not easy, and we're still trying to figure things out. We're still learning and still adjusting, you know, on a daily basis. And so we also recognize that a lot of change, maybe with your family members. So maybe you are now responsible for helping to be that person, for your for your sibling, for your young, younger sibling to help, to tutor them, or maybe your parents need you to pick up a second job to help out financially. We understand that there's job loss, there's people that are getting sick, and so it's a lot to manage, it's a lot to balance. And so don't feel alone, and know that there are ways to not only identify when you're starting to feel that stress and anxiety, but of course, there are ways to manage and cope. These are things that I can't guarantee that will go away, but at least, let's talk about the tools and resources that you have externally and maybe even internally, that are going to help you get through this time. Because it's going to be a long year. I'll be honest, it might go real. It might go by really fast, but I can anticipate for a lot of us, it's going to feel like a very long semester. And so I think with that, just know that you're not alone. Know that also cats has really amazing workshops. So please check out their their workshops that they have all throughout the semester. We have that one. I'm really excited about a partnership I have with the amazing Dr. Jacob Chaco, who's our Assistant Director of Diversity and Inclusion, and we're going to be talking also about the basics of what does what is diversity, inclusion, equity. Now that you are in college, you may have, you know, received or gotten exposure to that in high school, but there are a lot of identities that students bring into the spaces that they're in. And so I think college is a really great time for you to explore those identities, to understand the intersectionality. So you know myself, I am a woman of color that has a, you know, a secondary degree, and so I have multiple identities that I bring into spaces, but even as a professional staff, I'm still learning about the. Language that we use today and how we can be more inclusive, and that's not something that goes away. So again, we're doing this our first year students, but know that this is it's really a lifelong process and things that we're always having to adapt to and adjust and to learn. I think that's also what's really important about being in higher education, not just about the classroom experiences the knowledge that you're gaining, but it's how you're growing individually. Because these are things that, honestly, employers are going to be looking at. They're going to be looking at the language that you use and how you work with the, you know, diverse groups of people. These are all really critical and not even what do they call soft skills. They're really essential skills that you need to be able to thrive and do well, you know, personally, academically and professionally. So definitely be on the lookout for those events, and then we'll have a lot more to come in the semester, so you'll just have to, you know, stay tuned with us.

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much for sharing that with us. Ashley, yes, essential skills very important, and they can learn that all here at CSUSB. So Ashley, can you tell us a little bit about what you find most rewarding about your job and what you do?

Ashley Watterson  
So I think the most rewarding thing is seeing students in their journey from when they start in their first year to where they are when they come into their second year. You know, I have a few examples of students where they come in, you know, very quiet, not really sure what they want to do. They want to get involved, but not really sure how to and then now I look at them, and they're orientation leaders, and they're my, you know, my my speakers for some of my events, and to see that growth is really amazing, because that's really what college is about, I think, too, is giving yourself that opportunity to grow as a person, to grow to be the person you want to be, so that you can continue to set the example for your family, for your community members, I mean, even for yourself. So to be able to see all of that development in the first year is extremely rewarding, because it makes me feel like I'm doing something right, even if you have one takeaway from any of the events that I do to me that is extremely valuable, and that's kind of my way of, you know, being in service to others. I've always been very service oriented. I was in, you know, National Honor Society and California scholarship Federation, all of those things, even in a sorority and undergrad. So being able to give back in that way and to support students and their family members, because going to college is not easy. And I'm also really grateful that I have really amazing partners, such as you know yourself, Matt and Star, who have really just been on board with all of my ideas and the things that we've tried to accomplish in the time that I've been at CSUSB, and it's just been rewarding to be on a campus that is very, I feel very family oriented, and really we do invest a lot of time and energy into our students. And I'm really proud to be a part of of the pack.

Matt Markin  
And I know, for start, I like, whenever it's like, oh, Ashley's asking for help or wants to collaborate, we don't say no, we can't like, we always are like, we're gonna say yes, like, and I think that's just a testament to you, the hard work that you do and always wanting to work with others. So we definitely appreciate it. And our last question would be if students or parents, if they have questions or they want to get in contact with your office, or for students, I want to know, hey, what are some of these upcoming events Astrid is talking about? Where can they go?

Ashley Watterson  
Sure, so you can always email us @ofye@csusb.edu, that's orientation, first year experience. So OFYE, you can also call us. We are still answering phones and returning voicemails, so feel free to call us at 909-537-5233, I also highly encourage you to follow us on social media. We have a lot of great polls. Sometimes we even give away things just by you responding to some of our you know any of our questions that are happening? So please follow us @csusbofye  all, all together. We also will be sharing every week what's happening during that week. So you want to know what's going on, what different events or opportunities, even some important deadlines that are coming up, maybe your registration deadlines are are coming up financial aid, we also share all that information, so make sure to follow us on Instagram as well.

Star Wildes  
Thank you so so much. Don't forget, if you have any questions, Ashley, again, the information, please make sure you contact her in her office. But Ashley, it's been such a pleasure, not only listening to everything that you have to say, but also, you know, just sharing your experience, sharing everything that you do, thank you so much for serving our students, for being here, and all that you do. You're amazing.

Ashley Watterson  
Thank you. You're amazing too Star and you too, Matt.

Matt Markin  
Thank you. 

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much, Ashley for the amazing information you have shared with us again. We hope this was helpful.

Matt Markin  
And next up, we have two great individuals from the College of Natural Sciences, Dr. Lisa Guzman and Nick Hall. We've had a lot of great questions from you, yodes, about the Natural Sciences College, especially about the nursing major, so we thought it'd be great to have Dr. Guzman and Nick talk to you about what the College of Natural Sciences offers, answer some of those questions about nursing, and also give you some information about some of their upcoming workshops and how to get in contact with them and schedule appointments. So let's dive right in.

Star Wildes  
We have amazing guests with us here. Dr. Guzman currently serves as the Director of Advising for the College of Natural Sciences, professional Advising Center, health professions Advising Center and STEM Center at California State University. San Bernardino. She has spent over 20 years as a higher education professional researcher and scholar. Her research focuses on alumni, volunteerism and relationship building among university and community stakeholders that foster opportunities for student academic and professional success. Her bachelor's degrees was earned at University of California, Berkeley, in psychology and sociology. She has a master's degree in higher education from the University of Michigan. Her PhD was earned at the University of Michigan in higher education with a concentration in organizational behavior and management. Welcome, Dr. Guzman. And also joining us is Nick Hall is a pre Health Advisor with the Health Professions Advising Center. He graduated from CSUSB with a bachelor's in political science and got his master's degree from the University of Tennessee in college student personnel. He has been with H pack for a little over a year now, and before that, he worked in Housing and Residence Life in the University of Tennessee. Nick loves music and plays guitar. He also enjoys reading and collecting rare books. Thank you so much for being with us. 

Matt Markin  
I'm glad to be here. Yes, welcome both, and we're glad for both of you to be here on the podcast, especially to represent the College of Natural Sciences, one of the largest academic colleges at Cal State, San Bernardino, and with a lot of great majors and a lot of students like we said. So speaking of majors, and not sure who wants to take this question, but with the College of Natural Sciences, what majors do you offer?

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
Well, I could take that. Yeah, we have a lot of majors, and we have a lot of students, as you mentioned, in our college, we have nine departments, and I can list those for you. We have Department of Biological Sciences. We have chemistry and biochemistry. We have computer science and computer engineering. We have geological sciences, health science and human ecology, and we have four concentrations in that department. So we have environmental health, we have healthcare management, nutrition and food science and public health, education, and we also have Department of Kinesiology, mathematics, nursing and physics.

Star Wildes  
There's a lot of major and majors, and like Matt said, the largest colleges that we have here at Cal State. So can you tell us a little bit about the impacted majors? Now, we do have impacted majors. Now we do have impacted majors and just a little bit of background. Impacted majors may have prerequisites and certain requirements that students need to fulfill prior to declaring into this impacted major, right? So can you give us any an example of the impacted major or majors you may have within your college? 

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
So we have two impacted majors in our college, and one of them is kinesiology, and that's allied health. And then we also have nursing, pre nursing.

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much for for that information. 

Matt Markin  
And then kind of going along that with impacted majors. So nursing is a very popular major that students inquire about. And so you have students that maybe applied to university and they were accepted into pre nursing. And then you also may have had students that wanted to do pre nursing but were not accepted into pre nursing through the admissions process, or students while they started at Cal State found out about that we had a nursing program and are now interested in trying to want to get into nursing. So I guess this is kind of like two questions, right? You have students that are pre nursing, what's their process to try to hopefully get into the nursing program? And then the follow up would be for students that are now interested in doing nursing, are they. Able to still try to get into the nursing program if they're not pre nursing?

Nick Hall  
Sure, and I think I can, I can answer that question. So for students that are already pre nursing majors, the interesting thing about nursing as a major is that it's a two step process. So the first thing is, you need to be a pre nursing major, and those majors will basically take a list of prerequisite classes for the actual nursing approach program, and then there's an application process to actually become a nursing major. So unlike some of our other impact majors, it's not a guaranteed thing. It is a very it is one of our most impacted programs we have. There's a very limited number of seats, only about 50 seats per admissions term. So it is very competitive. So with the pre nursing students, their first serve pre nursing student, they take their list of classes, and they apply to the program. They're accepted into the program, then they become an official Nursing Major. Now for students that aren't pre Nursing majors currently. Unfortunately, one of the issues with the impaction is that to be able to apply for the nursing program, you have to first be a pre Nursing Major. Unfortunately, you aren't able to switch into pre nursing as major unless you were originally admitted to the university as a pre Nursing Major. Now, there are still other ways to become a nurse, and there are a lot of other great programs that we have, and we can definitely go into those as well.

Matt Markin  
Yeah, and I think that that is a good segue to go into that. So like, if, let's say there's a student that maybe apply is in pre nursing doesn't get accepted into the nursing program, or student that is not a pre nursing major wants to try to get into nursing and can't because they weren't originally pre nursing. What could be some options for them to to still pursue that goal of becoming a nurse?

Nick Hall  
Yeah, definitely. So there are a couple different pathways for one, and this is sort of an alternative option. Is we do have a lot of other great health related majors within the university, so if you're interested in nursing and maybe some other things as well, we also have, like we had mentioned, a couple different health science degrees, you know, public health, education, nutrition, great options. Of course, any of our majors, such as biology or chemistry, also great to set up for future career in the health professions. However, if nursing is your definite that's what I'm going to do. Nothing's going to stop me from becoming a nurse. Then there are other pathways for one you're you can always take the prerequisite classes that you need for a nursing program, and then basically transfer as an upper division, transfer for your last couple of years into another nursing program. And that's definitely one thing I talked about with our pre Nursing majors and our students that are interested in nursing in general, is that, because nursing programs are so impacted, they're so difficult to get into in California, it's a great idea to keep your options open and to, you know, apply for multiple programs. You know, potentially as a transfer student, and then so there are other programs nearby, both at the community college and at the four year university level, for still ultimately pursuing a nursing degree.

Matt Markin  
All right, thanks Nick for that. I mean, we definitely get that question a lot. And so I think this gives alternatives for students who are still interested in nursing and you know, and hopefully those that are listening might be contacting you, or, depending, they might talk with us, and we have some information now that we can give them. So our next question that that we want to talk about is about advising, and that's the new advising structure. So with the new advising structure, when would a student meet with an advisor within the College of Natural Sciences, and how would they schedule an appointment?

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
Yeah, that's a great question. I think even particularly this year is there's a lot of changes, I think, across campus, with advising. And you know, students really do need to know, you know, who they should be seeing and when. So for the college, a lot of the students that we'll be seeing coming into this next year are really going to be students who are right about 45 credit units or higher. So those students are mostly going to be on the precipice of their junior year, juniors and seniors. And I think it really gives the students an opportunity to connect with us about the next steps as they're going into looking at their academic plans and their career plans. And I'm sure you've already talked a lot about this and on other podcasts about students coming to advising and academic services and getting that advising there really early on another piece of advising, I think, that we definitely need to speak about is faculty advising. Our faculty are available to see students really throughout their time here. And that's really what we want the students to know, is they have support all through their time here at CSUSB. So yes. So we have several ways for students to actually schedule an appointment. With us, and the first way is through just calling us. We have an appointment scheduling line that's dedicated to for appointments, and that number is 909-537-7345. They can also reach us through email. So that's cnsadvising@csusb.edu and then a couple places on our website. So if you visit CNS website called natural sciences, so that's csusb.edu forward slash CNS, if you navigate anywhere through that website, you will see a button that says, schedule an appointment, and you can click that as well. If you're a continuing student, you can also find that self service through your Student Center.

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much for that, for that information and and going with this question is, let's say a student is at 45 units, right, and they're encouraged to meet with an advisor. When do you suggest that students should meet with an advisor per your center to receive advising, especially as we know that registration is going to be coming up for spring. When do you encourage students to make those appointments with you?

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
Yeah, I think you know, you mentioned earlier that we do have a large college over 5000 students, and that's a lot of students to see, even if it's just juniors and seniors. Primarily, I would encourage students to schedule appointments early. Sometimes we are scheduled and booked two to three weeks out sometimes, and we have advisors that want to see you all through the year, not just during registration time. There's never a bad time to schedule an appointment with an advisor.

Matt Markin  
And with the College of Natural Sciences, there's three different centers, right? You have the professional Advising Center, the Health Professions Advising Center, and the STEM center. Can you talk a little about the differences between those centers?

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
Yes, so our professional Advising Center is really set to meet with all students in all nine of our departments, so we see all of those students. We also have our health professions Advising Center, and we have our STEM Center, and our STEM Center is focused more on students who are in the STEM field. But our health professions Advising Center are really set for students who are interested in careers in health professions. And for those students, we really want to encourage them to come to meet with us early, so even in their freshman sophomore year. And maybe Nick can say a little bit more about that.

Nick Hall  
Yeah, so the health professions Advising Center is a little different in that we do a little bit of academic advising, but also a lot of career and pre professional school advising. So with that, especially with some of those professional programs like medical school and dental school, there's a lot you need to do as an undergraduate. So it's good to meet with with us early and kind of identify those things and sort of make like a timeline for yourself through your four years of college into what you need to do to then go to that next step of graduate school. And the other thing is that even though we're housed in the College of Natural Science, we will meet with students from across the university. You know, I do have psychology majors that are interested in medical school, and they're welcome to make appointments with us as our our alumni as well. I do have students come back that have already graduated their Institute in some sort of health profession program. So welcome to you with us.

Star Wildes  
That is awesome. And thank you both for covering that, and I know that you aimed within your college, especially advising. That's a lot of resources that students need to know about right as far as you know, speaking about resources, what resources do you encourage students to utilize, especially this term? I know everything we're you know is online, virtual, and I know that you guys have amazing upcoming events that we are posting on our social media, that we're letting our students know about. But can you speak on that, as far as the resources that's available to all students during this time? 

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
We have a lot of resources this year. We know that being in a virtual environment, we want to make opportunities available to students nonetheless, and a lot of our workshops are actually tailored towards a virtual environment. So we had, we just had, this week, an introduction to virtual campus resources, but a couple others coming up on creating a successful virtual learning environment. I think those are going to be very important, as well as time management in this virtual environment, even steps to begin career exploration, as I mentioned, I don't think it's you're really ever too early to start doing that, but also just managing stress. I think that's a really important piece right now that we wanted to make sure that we covered with students. But we also have some. Particular to our health professions. So we will be having, on September 14, An Introduction to Health Professions. So students that might be interested in health professions, or may not not, may not even know that they're interested in a career in health professions, might want to come to a workshop like that. We also have virtual career panels that we're covering this year, and that will be really one for every single one of our departments, including teaching. So I definitely encourage students to look out for those. 

Matt Markin  
Yeah, absolutely. And great workshops that will be coming up, and I really do hope that students will take advantage of that. And speaking of other resources, though, like, let's say, you know, maybe we asked Nick this question. Like, let's say you're meeting with a student who is struggling academically. What are some resources that you know of that you might be able to refer students to?

Nick Hall  
Sure, yeah, I'd say always, first and foremost, reach out to your professors. They have office hours. They're there to help. You know, they're kind of the primary resource when it comes to understanding difficult material. But then, apart from that, we also have a wide range of sort of supplemental programs. They're under the umbrella of our coyote plus programs, and there are quite a few of those. We have supplemental instruction, tutoring. Stuff like our Writing Center is a great one. I refer to students a lot for especially with health professions, because they're not there just to help with academic writing, but they can also help with stuff like writing, you know, a personal statement for a graduate program. So our coyote plus programs are great. We have a lot of those, and also reaching out to each other, I think that's really important, especially since we're virtual, it's a little harder to just lean over to the person sitting next to you and, you know, ask them a question. So I encourage you to, kind of, as a student, just reach out to each other, maybe start a group me for your class, or some sort of, you know, group text, and help each other out too, because I think that's that was always important for me as a student.

Star Wildes  
And thank you so much for that. I want to ask you both this last question, what is something encouraging that you want to let students know about, especially during this time? I know that some students have shared you know that they're finding it challenging to exactly what you said. Nick, look over to over the shoulder and say, Hey, can you help me with this? So some have said that they started a group me. Some have said, you know, I just reached out to this one student. I thought it would be helpful. But any encouragement for our students, and we'll start with you. Dr. Guzman, any encouragement for our students during this time?

Dr. Lisa Guzman  
Yeah, I think I would want students to know that we're here for them, even though we're in a virtual environment. I know we have a large staff of advisors that that are here to support you, and we're trying to create opportunities for you to connect with each other, as we mentioned here today, how important that is, how difficult that might be, but we're trying to create those opportunities for you, and if you need support, reach out, because we have our three centers, but we also have wonderful resources all across the campus, and I would encourage you to seek those out as well.

Nick Hall  
And I'd say at least for me, I'd also add that, you know, even though We're virtual, I would still encourage you all as students to get involved with campus, even though that looks very different. It might not look like how you expected things, especially if your first year entering in to college here. But you know, we still have great student organizations and clubs that you can become a member of that's a great way to connect with students. You name it. We have a club for it, basically. And if we don't, you can start it. So, you know, we have a lot of great, some of our great colleagues that work in the Student Life section of our university. They're there to help you, if you were interested in starting one office of student engagement. So, yeah, I'd encourage you again, reach out to each other form groups you know, get to know each other, even if it's virtually. And yeah, get involved.

Matt Markin  
And as we end the interview, if students have questions on you know where to go for the workshops, or want to engage, connect with you all. Do you have any social media? 

Nick Hall  
So we we post our like flyers for any sort of workshops or events that we have going on for each of our three centers, on both Instagram and Twitter. So for our professional Advising Center, we have an Instagram and a Twitter for both of those, it's CSUSB underscore PAC for the health professions advising center. Again, we have an Instagram and a Twitter Same, same handle for both CS USB underscore HPAC, which is HPAC, and then we also have our STEM center. Their Instagram is CSUSB underscore, stem underscore center, and their Twitter is CSUSB stem, all one word, so you can find basically any of our flyers for any of your events there at. Also, we do post a lot of that on our websites as well.

Star Wildes  
Dr. Guzman and also Nick, we truly appreciate your time here with us, and for all our listeners out there, we hope that you found this information very helpful as we continue to guide you with our podcast information. So thank you so much for joining us. We are so excited and looking forward to not only listening and but having our listeners. Listen to all the information you provide and for everyone out there, tune in for our next episode coming up. And thank you again. Dr Guzman and Nick.