Ep. 2 - Financial Aid and Getting Ready for Fall

Welcome to Episode 1 of the CSUSB Advising Podcast! Yoties, in this episode, we talk to Financial Aid to answer all your financial questions about disbursements and w/ Undergraduate Studies to offer advice taking classes in a virtual environment. Take a listen and enjoy! Go Yotes! 

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Transcript

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 with both CSUSB campus resources and those in academic advising. Sit back and enjoy go. Yotes.

Matt Markin  
Hey, Yotes. Welcome to our first real episode of CSUSB advising podcast. We're super excited for you to be here and super excited for our fall semester to be starting in a couple of weeks. My name is Matt Markin. I'm an academic advisor and the graduation pledge Coordinator here at Cal State San Bernardino. And let me introduce to you Star Wildes.

Star Wildes  
Hi, I'm Star Wildes, academic advisor and undeclared coordinator for the advising and academic services office. I'm so excited about our new podcast. Matt, this is amazing, long time coming, and another resource via our social platforms for our students and parents is exciting. What do we have for this podcast, Matt?

Matt Markin  
We got some two great interviews coming up in a little bit, one from Financial Aid and one from the Undergraduate Studies Office. I'm super excited for the fall to start, but students and parents, are you excited? Are you feeling nervous, anxious, and if you're feeling a combination of all of that, that is natural. We can't wait for our continuing students to experience the semester system. And of course, we welcome all our new coyotes to the CSUSB family. But star, just in case anyone missed our preview episode. Tell everyone a little bit about yourself.

Star Wildes  
Hi. Thanks, Matt. So I am a CSUSB graduate with a psychology degree and also masters in public administration, concentration in leadership. I've been at CSUSB since 2002. If you guys could do the math, you maybe can find out how old I am, but I've been truly blessed and honored to work with amazing colleagues to help our students. Truly passionate about helping our students. I've held various positions on campus as a student assistant and now in academic advising. Truly love what I do and helping students and parents right and just guiding students on their academic journey. So Matt, tell us a little bit about yourself. 

Matt Markin  
And I will say, you know, you hear a lot of people say helping students, and honestly, that is Star. That's the definition you look up helping in the dictionary, you see Star's face right there. 

Star Wildes  
Likewise. Matt, too. Matt, too.

Matt Markin  
But Star and I kind of grew up here. We started around the same time, so I also started in 2002 I got my bachelor's degree in psychology. And my master's in education, more specifically in career and technical education. And I've been working in the admissions office. I've worked in advising academic services now for goodness, seven years now as an academic advisor. So really love the campus. It's It's my home. And I think star as well will say that this is her home too. I mean, we are coyotes for life, I think. And we hope that you enjoy this podcast. You learn a lot from it. Hopefully we'll be able to engage and connect with you through this podcast. But this is being posted on Monday, August 10. So what do we have coming up to look forward to. Well, hey, the fall semester is going to be starting, but fall semester tuition fees are due August 13. If you are receiving financial aid, your fees are deferred until financial aid releases the aid. And we're going to get some more information in our upcoming interview with financial aid in a little bit. But also, just to let you know, the first day of Saturday classes for the fall semester starts August 22 the first day of regular classes start. August 24 and a couple more days to think about. August 28 is the last day to add open classes for the fall semester through your My coyote account. And also on August 28 that's the last day that the wait list period ends. So what is all of this that we're talking about with adding with wait list? Maybe you also have questions about dropping or change of majors. Well, we do have the office of the register coming up in our next episode, but star our first guest, we've had a lot of questions about financial aid. Can you intro us who our first guest is going to be?

Star Wildes  
Thank you so much. Matt. Yes, our guest for financial aid will be Diane Byrd. Diane Byrd has amazing a wealth of experience in the financial aid office. We've had the honor and privilege of working with her via our live advising sessions on social media, and she is going to be amazing. She's going to share a lot of the information you need to know about financial aid disbursements and everything you need to know, as far as you know, the differences between Student Financial Services and Financial Aid. Super excited, because I know a lot of students have had questions, and let's, without further ado, let's go ahead and join Diane for her interview.

Diane Byrd  
Hi, I'm Diane Byrd. I'm with the Financial Aid Office. I am currently the client services coordinator and advisor in the Financial Aid Office.

Matt Markin  
Awesome. Well, welcome Diane to our podcast, and you've worked in Financial Aid at Cal State San Bernardino. Can you tell us what you find most rewarding about your job?

Diane Byrd  
Most rewarding I find in my job is helping students and getting them success, to get their financial aid package in a timely manner and making sure they feel comfortable that they have enough financial aid to cover their tuition and fees, or if they need extra expenses, such as for housing, or, you know, other things that might come up, as far as car expenses, or, you know, books.

Star Wildes  
That is awesome. And I know as we go into this fall semester, semester is new for us all here at Cal State, when should students expect their financial aid to be dispersed? I know this is a very important and a question that we've been asked many times.

Diane Byrd  
Yes, we're getting a lot of those calls. We do starting fall, usually financially disperses about 10 days prior to the term. So we're looking around August 12 to start those disbursements. And we usually tell students allow three to five business days for that disbursement to hit their account and then receive a refund.

Matt Markin  
One question that we have too is, my students talk about have questions about disbursement. Is it directly dispersed to them, or does tuition campus fees get taken out first? How does that all work?

Diane Byrd  
Okay, so once financial aid runs, disbursement initially will pay any balance they have on their account for that term, it won't go back and pay previous balances as it will only pay that that term. So if you had charges for tuition and fees and housing that financially would be that first anything that's remaining then goes to the student. So that's why they would encourage direct deposit that when you get your refund in a timely manner, if they don't have enough financial aid to cover their tuition, we recommend that they pay that difference before the due date of fees. So if they only have enough to cover, you know, if their fees are $3700 and let's say they only have about $2500 to cover, they want to pay that difference. And I know that's a lot of questions, what we get on student account side, because they will go in and try to make the difference, but it gives them the full amount. They just have to edit it and then put the remaining amount that they're gonna they're gonna pay. That's awesome. 

Star Wildes  
And I know we've had this question as well, if a student does not see any financial aid via their account, and they have turned in all the documents that were requested by financial aid, filed FAFSA, what can a student do?

Diane Byrd  
I would definitely give us a call. So we are, even though we're working remotely through these challenging times, we are on the phones from eight to five, and I know recently we've had a little bit of a high volume in calls because, of course, fees are becoming due, and they're not senior packages. So definitely give us a call as well as we also have an email that is a general email question, and that's financialaid@csusb.edu. Definitely can email that if you're unable to sit on the phone and wait for a live person to answer, usually, maybe they'll wait time. I know I've had her students 45 minutes to wait, but if you definitely want to give us a call, because if you don't have a package right now, it might be because you're pending documentation, or maybe there's something on our side that we overlooked that we need to fix. So you get your aid awarded to you.

Matt Markin  
Basically, for students, keep trying. Is a high, high peak season, I guess, right now for financial aid, but they are available. And so if you call email, you will get some some response from their office. Now, one question too that comes up is, there's financial aid and scholarships, and there's also Student Financial Services. And I think sometimes there's a confusion in terms of like, well, what does each office do? Can you talk about, maybe with each each department, what the differences are?

Diane Byrd  
So I know the departments gets confusing. They used to be called Student Accounts Office, so it was a little bit easier. But then they changed the name to student financials. So then they call us, and we're like, No, we don't, you know, do the payment plans. So student financials is directly they do the payment plans. They do if you're going to make a payment online, it's to them. Financial aid is strictly awarding you based off your FAFSA and your dream application. So when we receive those applications, we award students, the dream students, and students who are filling the FAFSA, and then we award it. And then, once we run disbursements, then that money is issued to Student Accounts Office, who then issues, pays your tuition, your housing, etc, and then the money is then distributed to you if you have a refund. So student financials, the one that disperses, we disperse it. They cut, you know, basically pay the tuition, and then cut the refunds, and then they work out the payment plans. Sometimes we have students. That might have prepaid their payment, and let's say they got a tuition fee paying program such as Cal Grant or State University grant. Later on, that student would be encouraged to call student financials because they may have a credit on their account, because they actually had to fill out a form to receive that credit, which is called a refund request form. So just keep in mind, there's some students that still panic with the pending financial aid because they didn't see it dispersed, they go ahead and make their payment. So a lot of times, their money will pay, and they have this credit, but they won't issue out the credit because it they already had paid cash, or they pay by credit card, and if it was state funding that paid their tuition, they have to request it where they want the money to go towards back to that credit card, or do they want to go back to their bank.

Star Wildes  
For students that need to turn in documentation? I know you had mentioned this before, but how I know they can fax, they can email. Can you provide that information for us again? How may they be able to turn their documents in?

Diane Byrd  
So right now, if you haven't been awarded financial aid, you might have a to do list item on your Student Center. So you want to definitely look at your Student Center. We actually have a couple tutorials on our Instagram page, which is csusbfa, that shows you how to look at your award and your Student Center via laptop or via your mobile phone. Definitely want to look at that, because a lot of that's a big question that we get. I can't see anything. I can't I don't know where to go. Do I go my financials? Do I go to my account? How do I review? Review that? But if you have a to do, such as verification or assistantship documentation or selective service, anything that we're requesting, you want to either fax it, which is the numbers 909-537-7024, or definitely, you can mail it. We do pick up mail and faxes about twice a week. However, we're still having the incoming information, so we're all departments enrollment management, are working closely together to make sure that we get all the documents in and forwarded to staff to process. So either it's through fax, either through mail, or it might be through our enrollment management drop box right outside of University Hall, which is the primary entrance. We're getting a lot more documents in that drop box. I think it's more convenient for students and at least they know fax machine. I'll be honest. You know fax machine. You just never know. Even though you get that confirmation, it's like, okay, you know, we've had a few students. So I always advise either you want to do it two ways. You maybe do facts and then maybe come by and put in the drop box, but you always want to make sure you put it in an envelope, sealed attention financial aid, and make sure in all your documents, your student ID number is in there. We have students dropping off, just like we just need parents taxes, so they drop off the taxes in the envelope, but they don't put the student's ID number. So we do, we do research. We do, you know, we can find the student, but it would make us easier if you would just, you know, put the student ID number on everything. That way, it's easy for us to track it and make sure we get the paperwork and done in a timely manner, but those are the three sources. Now, I do have staff that will email a student I need this additional documentation signed, and as long as it's not has a lot of private information, such as tax returns, if it's just a simple form, meaning their signature or check box, they missed a check box off the verification worksheet. We just say, you know, go ahead and email it to my personal email. I mean, I've personally had that with students where they've had a statement missing from their staff appeal, and so I've just said, Hey, you know, why don't you just go ahead and email, you know, email it to us, because sometimes we can work that out with you. And I we've do receive emails through the general one. We just hate for you to submit confidential information through the email, because you just never know.

Matt Markin  
Definitely great advice. And I think the Dropbox, for sure, is a great addition to have, especially during this current time. So at least they can go right outside University Hall, put in the Dropbox they know it's safe and secure and that there is representatives that are checking throughout the week. Now you talked about email and talked about phone earlier. So a question with that, too is with students contacting financial aid, whether they're contacting via the phone or email, I guess with email, are they, when you mentioned general questions for email, they email anything specific for their their specific financial aid package, or something specific for them? Would you rather have them call, or can they still be answered through email?

Diane Byrd  
So with the like, I work the financial scholarships emails as well with the associate director, and she pretty much works on we work on them daily. So anything that's maybe a general question, like, where do I find my financial aid award, or where to when are disbursements? But if it's specific to like verification or their staff appeal, then we direct it to that staff member. So that staff member then usually replies to that student individually. So I get a lot of emails forwarded if our associate director is working and it's based on Alpha, right? So you. A lot of us work with an alpha basis for our students. So we look at the information I get, probably daily emails that I respond to the student. And some of these students need appointments. So a lot of them are requesting, you know, I really need to talk to a staff member. I really need to go over my appeal. I need to go over my verification. And so we'll respond such an email, and I will ask take, you know, I've got your email. I've read your you know questions, when would you like yourself an appointment? And then they go email me back, and that's availability. So we do zoom appointments, we do phone appointments, whichever is comfortable for the student, especially students right now with special circumstances. So we have a lot of students in these trying times with covid. A lot of students and parents have lost their jobs, or they've been furloughed, or they're just going through a financial situation versus and because fast pick is two years, right? So fast we put in 2018 information. Well, a lot has changed from 2019 2020 so we do have a link on our website that they can fill out a special cases application, and then that directly is going to the financial aid advisor who specializes in those special circumstances. And then they'll set up an appointment to talk to that student to see what type of information that we can do to help because, again, a lot of these students things have changed, or it could be, you know, a parent had passed away, or a divorce, anything that is a special circumstance. We have students that are fostering students. We have students that are don't have contact with parent, and they may need to get in with a financial aid advisor for an appointment. So they definitely can email that general email or fill out the special cases. On our website, it's under award. I think it's under our main office page, current students. I think it's an award processing, and a little link will show special cases. And right there, they'll have to log into myCoyote, fill out your information, and that goes directly to a manager, and then that manager will then forward that to that team to get a hold of the student. And usually it's about 2424 hours, 48 for that staff member to get back to them. But if it's after that, they should be contacting us again, like, Hey, I reached out. I still haven't heard definitely, they want to keep contact with us, because I have students, well, you know, I've called three times or, you know, and that's where we don't want that to happen to a lot of students, you know. We want to be able to make sure that they're heard and make sure that their circumstance is taken care of, because we are in this, you know, pandemic. 

Star Wildes  
That's a great resource for students and for them to know about that. That's great. Thank you so much. Diane. Another question that we've had is scholarships. How can students apply for scholarships? Can you let us know a little bit about how students can apply for scholarships and where they can apply?

Diane Byrd  
Right now for the on campus fellowships that unfortunately is already closed for the academic year, for 2021 but we're looking for the future, it opens up November 1 2020 so it kind of lines up with your fast focus, fast when I still get this question, oh, FAFSA opened in October. Yeah. Like you want to work on it midnight on October 1, but definitely want to fill it out October 1. Dream application opens October 1, but the scholarships is a little bit we kind of say November 1, and then the priority deadline, and the deadline for scholarships is March 2 of every year. So those are on campus. Scholarships is a very easy process, and we do. I don't not sure how we're going to be doing your workshops this year. I know it's gonna be virtual, but we'll definitely be doing those workshops to kind of show you how to click on the link on your Student Center to apply for those scholarships. Now, there's a lot of off campus scholarships that you can go to through search engines, and we have those available on our website as well under other aid and I'm assuming, but as far as you know, definitely, like, look around, there's different types of places. Southern California, Edison, I know Cardenas is giving out scholarships. So there's a lot of different areas in the Inland Empire themselves that give out scholarships.

Matt Markin  
And I think the kind of the way to look at is, like, there's, there's money in a lot of different places, scholarships, grants, you know, even loans. Now, as we get kind of towards the end of this interview, one of the questions that has come up a lot, especially with continuing students, is SAP, and they might look on their to do list and they see failed SAP or academic plan, can you tell us what SAP is, and if students, if it shows on their to Do List. Can they still do an appeal for SAP?

Diane Byrd  
Okay, so SAP, federal academic progress we run every year. It's because it's mandated by Department of Ed that we go by the quantitative and the qualitative standard, right? So it's basically looking at earn units versus attempted and it's also looking at your two year GPA. So two year GPA is about 2.0 so the Earn units versus attempted if you fall under a certain percentage as an undergrad or postbac, then you do fail SAP if you're over terms. And I know the conversion between quarter and semester was a little bit like, What do you mean? I'm I, you know, last year I wasn't at 270 right? But. Now I'm at down 180 so now I'm not being sad because I'm over the units, because I've, you know, I'm going to graduate, but I'm not over and post fact students were, you know, at the term. So now it's down to eight terms versus the nine terms. So they, they're, you know, it's a conversion for everybody, right, to learn from the quarter versus semester. So with the satisfactody academic progress, they usually will get a notification around July 1 of every year. And we have two different types. We have students and we have also EOP students that come into this category. The difference is EOP students who don't meet Satisfactory Academic Progress, they actually have to notify EOP office, and they had to meet with their EOP counselor. They wouldn't send that information to our office. For other students, they do need to submit the information. When they were given the letter, they had 15 days to turn in that appeal from the time that they received the letter that they failed staff. After those 15 days, the financial aid was canceled. Doesn't mean that they're not going to get the financial aid. However, they had a time frame they need to submit the appeal form, if they haven't yet already, and if they have an academic plan, which I know a lot of offices are pretty open in getting that signature to the students through Adobe. So I haven't seen a lot of students that have that problem. But if you're having that problem, getting an academic plan, at least submit the appeal in your statement. And then once you get the academic plan, you can submit it later. We just want to make sure you get to make sure you get that information in, because you fall in that 15 day window. So appeal processing happens. When a committee reviews them, they look at the circumstances of why the student had dropped courses and again, a lot of the rules on our website for failing staff is, you're looking at grades too, like the F's and no credits. And I know a lot of students did the no credits. We had a choice no credit or credit due to covid, right? So unfortunately, those students who got the no credits that fell into that staff rule. So a lot of times we see students that, you know, drop because of covid, and they have their statements, and there's something that's reviewed and looked at right but usually there's a turnaround around 7-10 businesses on these appeals. It's not more than four weeks. So we're trying to get those turned around as soon as possible. And if we need additional documentation, we let them know, but they have to make sure they have everything turned in in this statement if they want to provide supporting documents, such as, you know, if, let's say, for instance, if they want to, it was a child care issue, they want to, you know, provide a statement from child care for an employer. They can do that. We don't, we don't mandate it, but we recommend any supporting documentation in a statement, you know, a statement just why you felt that, how you're going to overcome and be successful the next year, and how, you know, they can get some assistance, and sometimes we refer them to different departments on campus when we approve the appeal.

Star Wildes  
I know that that we had a lot of questions, or a lot of the questions that were shared via our social media outlets from students that we've met with. And again, we are just so happy that you're able to join us via this podcast. And thank you so much again, Diane really answered a lot of these questions in which will definitely help our students.

Diane Byrd  
Thank you for letting me join in.

Star Wildes  
And thank you so much, Diane for providing us information about financial aid. We are truly again, so grateful that you are here with us to provide us with this amazing information that students and parents need to know about. So Matt, who will be joining us next?

Matt Markin  
Yes, thanks Star. So our next guest is Dr. Lesley Davidson Boyd. Lesley is currently the interim dean and AVP for Undergraduate Studies at CSUSB. She is also a faculty member at the University of Redlands, teaching in the graduate counseling program. She is a counselor by trade, and specializes in clinical issues affecting women and marginalized populations. Her research teaching and clinical work focus on the importance of mentorship and self reflection in the development and self efficacy and a sense of belonging in higher education, she completed her PhD in counselor education and supervision and her master's degree in career and clinical counseling. Leslie is a proud first generation student and a CSU alumni from the Inland Empire region of Southern California.

Matt Markin  
Lesley, welcome to the podcast. How are you? 

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Hi, thanks for having me on. 

Matt Markin  
Yeah, we're glad that you're able to be on our first episode. This is going to be, I think, a really good interview, and I think you'll have a lot of great advice for our students, but I think for students and even parents, before we jump into all the questions to kind of get to know you. You've been at Cal State for a few years now, you worked in various departments, including, like the career centers, College of Natural Sciences and now undergraduate studies. Can you kind of walk us through that, that journey of Lesley at Cal State, San Bernardino, and then where you're at? 

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Sure, yeah, it's actually been 10 years. In November, it'll be 10 years. Yeah, congrats, yeah. So far, I. Still here. So I started off as a career counselor in the career center, and then I also would coordinate all of our fairs, so it would bring employers to campus for hiring and things like that. And actually, when I was hired at Cal State, it was right in the middle of really, really bad budget times. There was only three of us that worked in the entire career center, and we kind of held all that together. Thankfully, it's thrived, and it's much bigger now. After working there, I actually went over to the College of Natural Science, and I worked with the Health Professions Advising Center. Actually built it so it was a brand new office, and I got to go in and just create it. And we just helped students that were interested in going into health career. So anything having to do with from being a doctor, a nurse practitioner, any of those types of graduate programs. But it was really fun for me, because it kind of brought together my interest, because my undergrads in biology, and then my masters and PhD are both in counseling, so it was able, like I was able to help people in the sciences. So I always had a lot of fun doing that. After being there for a few years, I did that job. And then I also became the director of student success for the College of Natural Sciences. So I handled academic grievances, or when students were having, you know, need some help and advocacy with professors, things like that. And then a couple years ago, I think it was two years ago now, I came over and I joined the UGS family. I started out as assistant dean, and I remember telling myself, this is good, this is the highest. I want to go in my career, right here. And then a year later, I got promoted to associate dean, and I was like, no, okay, really, this is good. This is the highest. Now I'm the dean and Interim Dean and AVP for undergraduate studies, which I have to say, I'm thankful and really lucky because I've worked with some amazing people on campus, but I think the people in undergraduate studies have more heart than anyone, so I could not do the work I do without all of you.

Star Wildes  
And as we look into again, we're starting fall and semester now, Matt and I have been used to this quarter, quarter advising. Now we're going to go into fall semester. So with fall term being mostly virtual, it's a virtual environment, and the exception to a few labs and art theater classes going to be on campus. What advice can you give new students, sharing out at starting out, sorry, starting out at CSUSB, and also continuing students.

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yeah, it's a rough time. So not only are like you said, we're converting and we're remote, so it's really the craziest of all worlds, but I think the best advice I could give is just to be patient, patient with the process. It's new for everybody, and then it's doubly new because of the virtual as you mentioned, we have only about 1% of our classes will be in person. So you know, that's not a lot, so pretty much, I'm guessing, most of your schedules will be online. We do have some awesome stuff that's been happening over the summer where faculty have been going to different conferences and learning communities to learn how to better teach online. But you know, we're all doing the best we can right now, which is why I say Be patient, and I think the other pieces don't give up. I think that you might have a rough semester, and you might have a great semester, but either way, you will make it through. And this won't be the way that it is forever, especially if you're a first time freshman. I know that it's it's a letdown, like it's hard, because you may have thought your college experience would be one thing, and now here we are. So I think that's difficult. I actually have a nephew that graduated from high school this year, and he's going into college, and I know for him, it's been difficult because of that so just so different than what you picture. But be patient. Know it's not forever. It's just temporary, and know that you'll get through and at the end of the day you'll get the classes you need to be able to be on your way to get your bachelor's and have this huge, great life ahead of you, and it'll all seem like a blip at the end of the day.

Matt Markin  
And speaking of advice. So you have your advice for students, sometimes we want to think about also the parents as well. So do you have any advice that you would give parents for our CSUSB students, how they might be able to support their children that are attending Cal State in this virtual environment? 

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yeah, absolutely. So I think anytime you're a parent where you have a college student in general, the number one thing is just to try and understand it's a huge transition. And even though it's a very positive thing, it's hard, you know, it's it's different than anything that's happened in the past, especially if you're a brand new student. So being there and just supporting your student, emotionally letting them know that it'll be okay, like I'm here for you. The one thing that I think is hugely different right now with the virtual environment is that people need a space so they need a quiet space that can have to be able to really focus and study, and that's hard. It's hard with bustling households, but anything you can do to provide that, even if it's only for an hour or two a day, is fantastic. And the other piece is, you know, you should feel good, like congratulate yourself, because even though we're in the middle of a global pandemic, and even though there's, you know, all sorts of crazy things happening, you. You still have, you know, have the privilege of being the parent of someone that's heading into college and that has made the decision to really better their lives.

Star Wildes  
Absolutely. Thank you for that in it. And as we look into the advising structure for first and second year students, can you let us know a little bit more about that, or can you talk about that?

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Sure. So this is it's unprecedented. So the first time in our history at CSUSB, we actually have quite a few professional academic advisors, and what that equates to, if you're a student or a parent, is meaning that you're going to get a much more tailored, direct program plan. So knowing what to take, when to take it, to be able to graduate in the manner that you want to, whether it's to four years or six years or two years if you're a transfer student, but having all these people here to advise you can really help with that. So one of the things that the university chose to do this year, and we're pushing this forward into semesters, is to make sure that we have a structure that supports students with where they're at so So for students that are zero to 44 units, you will be seen by our amazing advisors and advising and academic services. They will help to get you started on the GE courses that you need. And then in addition to that, they'll start the the pattern of what you need for pre reqs and things like that with your major as well as making sure that you're aware of the the different types of academic regulations. If there's forms you need to fill out all of that kind of stuff. Once you hit 45 units and above, you will then go to your college professional advisors. Now those advisors can still help you with anything in terms of understanding academic rules and petitions, but the other piece that they have is they work more closely with the academic department. So if you're a biology major and you go to your professional advisor in the College of Natural Sciences, they work more directly with the people that are teaching you those biology classes, and because of that, they understand more about the sequencing and those pieces. So the hope is that by the time you hit that mark, you have what you need in terms of your basic skills and in terms of your basic GE structure, and you're ready for that next step. Now the third layer that just sort of permeates over the whole thing is our faculty advisors and faculty are amazing mentors, and especially if you want to do anything that has to do with research, volunteer work those pieces. So at different points along your journey here, you will be interacting with your faculty, and you, of course, like anyone else, will have certain faculty that you're closer to than others, and you will find great mentors with that. But really, what we've tried to do is create a whole support network for students, so that you have your professional from the moment you get to campus, tell when you graduate. And I will tell you too, most of the time, our advisors are there to cheer you on when you're graduating as well. So we really, really enjoy going through this whole process.

Matt Markin  
The way I look at it, from what you've said, is that at every step of the way for students, there is going to be some sort of assistance. There's going to be an advisor, whether it's a advisor and advising academic services or a college professional advisor, a faculty member, there's always someone that's going to be able to assist them with any questions and make sure that they guide them down the road to graduation, because ultimately, that's the major goal, is to be able to walk across that stage and graduate. 

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yeah. And then to add on to that, we also have some great colleagues in student affairs. We have some wonderful support services, and not just social things like clubs and organizations, but also we have other support services or ways that we can help you. The other thing that we offer that is your academic advisor can really help with getting you connected with are things like our academic support services. So tutoring, mentoring, peer mentoring services, supplemental instruction. We have all sorts of supports to help you not only know what to take, but to be successful in what you're taking so that you can move along your path with undergraduate studies. 

Matt Markin  
There's ustd 1000 classes. And so some students might search for a class, and they might find a university studies 1000 class, or even a 2000 class. Can you talk about those classes?

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
So our ustd 1000 class, it's newly imagined, so we used to have it in the quarters, but it was a little bit different. It's our freshman learning community. And so what these are designed to do is they're one unit courses that are voluntary for you to take, but what they're meant to do is explore specialized topics. So they change all the time, but this year, what our offering is is social justice, activism and technology. So I think it folds in really nicely with what we're seeing right now in the larger scale within not only the US, but really around the world, in terms of social justice. So the 1000 classes tend to be that it also will infuse with that, though the special topics you'll also learn about some of the basic. Skills that you need to be successful in college, as well as exploring different types of majors and careers as they fit within those different topics. Now the uscd, 2000 classes are sophomore success courses, and those are courses that are more specialized. The one that we're offering this year is more geared towards career pathways, so looking at different types of careers that you can explore, and then it will be much more in depth in working you through, like the process with career counseling and things like that too. But again, those shifts, they do change year to year. I'm really excited, because this year we have two brand new offerings, and I know they're both going to be really impactful, with great instructors our social justice and activism one, not only do we have some of our CSUSB staff members, but we also have a couple of activists from the community that are going to come in and teach for us as well. So we've been able to put together what I think is a really nice program. But keep your eyes open. We also want to offer these courses in the spring, which is new. We've traditionally only offered them in the fall, so we're hopeful that we'll be able to to have more offerings like this in the future.

Matt Markin  
Good. So like, if a student misses out on getting the class for fall, there's probably a good chance that they'll be able to get that class for the spring, because they might hear about it a little bit later, maybe they'll find out from a friend or something, and and then it's like, Oh, I wish I could take that class. It sounds like something I could really benefit from, but they might have an opportunity in spring. Absolutely, that's our plan. And then one of the questions that probably come up is like, it sounds like a great class. It's something I would want to take. Is it baccalaureate level?

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
It is, yes. So you do get college credit for it. Like I said, it's one unit, two units for the 2000 class. You can take it multiple times too. And what's cool about learning communities as well, though the topics might be the same, because it's not a course in the traditional sense. You can take the same class twice and have a very different experience and learn very different things each time too. So it's a nice elective units, essentially. So you can take it up to three times and get three elective units. But and the other kind of pro tip for all you out there is it's a one unit course that won't have a ton of work to it. So if you need a unit for financial aid, this is the way to go, because it's not going to be too demanding. And that's the type of advice academic advisors will give you, so that's why you want to talk to them, but it's good class, just to kind of get your feet wet on a topic too.

Matt Markin  
Yeah. And for many majors, a lot of times, the general education requirements and the major requirements don't necessarily add up to enough units for graduation, where thereby some a lot of the majors students will still need elective units for graduation. And this could be also a great way to get some of those units for the electives towards graduation?

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yep, absolutely

Star Wildes  
Awesome. And, of course, the question, this question comes up in our advising appointments and during Online New Student Orientation, is, will spring 2021, semester be that's, that's a billion trillion dollar question right now?

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yeah, and I would like to say no, I think it'll be in person, but I don't honestly know. Obviously, none of us knows what the future holds, because we never thought we'd be at this place to begin with. I do know that it's the official stance of the Cal State right now is that we are definitely remote through December, so we'll find out what happens then. Our campus has been fairly good. Our president has been fairly good about communicating any news that we have. So I'm sure as soon as we know the students, you'll be contacted. There's some new technologies that we're using that actually have been really helpful, and you may have seen these pop up over the summer, but we have push alerts. So one thing you might want to do is download, and I'm sure they told you this at orientation, but download the mycoyote app, because there's some some cool stuff that you can get through there. But the push notifications will tell you things like that if we're going to be remote or in person, I think either way, the best part of it is, whether we're online or not, is we're getting better at figuring out how to offer classes virtually right now and again, it's it won't be forever. We're not going to become a completely online university. So it's just a matter of, kind of figuring out where we're at and being able to kind of be in the moment of not knowing which is difficult, but it's a good life lesson I hear. So I like under I like knowing things too, so I'm good with it.

Matt Markin  
So basically, stay tuned on the spring 2021, semester, what will happen? But Dr. Lesley Davidson Boyd, we really appreciate you being on for the podcast, especially being our first podcast. So thank you so much for joining us. So you gave a lot of great tips, and I wish when I was a student, I had that social justice class I could take so really jealous for it. I'm glad that our students now have that opportunity for it. I think it'll be really in a sense, and I'm not doing a cliche, but life changing for them.

Lesley Davidson Boyd  
Yeah. Thank you so much for having me on I'm honored. I'm sure it'll be an awesome podcast.

Matt Markin  
All right. Thank you so much. Take care.

Matt Markin  
And thank you again to Lesley for joining us from undergraduate studies, and also to Diane Byrd from financial aid again, yodes, we hope you learned a lot, and you know, hopefully if you have any questions, reach out to us through our social media, specifically through CSUSB advising, find us everywhere, from Instagram, Tiktok, Facebook, Twitter, anything else I might be missing out on, no star, but gonna give us an update on our next episode. 

Star Wildes  
Absolutely Matt, thank you. So Episode Two, we're so excited. We have guests from the Office of registrar. So if you want to know about wait listing, if you want to know about registration, anything related to that, we have our amazing colleagues from Office of the Registrar. So please join us in our next episode and find out more information about registrar. 

Matt Markin  
And don't forget to subscribe to our podcast. Whether you're on Apple podcast Spotify, or your favorite podcasting platform. You can also find us on the buzz sprout website, see you next time.