Making the most of Welcome Week

After months of waiting, Welcome Week is finally on the horizon. Our Student Experience and Engagement Team have compiled all the essential information you need to know about them, as well as their top tips to help you get the most from your first week at WBS.

We can’t believe that Welcome Week is now just days away! To introduce ourselves, we’re the WBS Student Experience and Engagement (SEE) Team: Gemma, Nicole, Isabel, Georgia, Liam and Lily. In essence, we’re a sub-team of the larger Undergraduate Programme Team who look after the administration of all aspects of your degree.

We work for, and alongside, the student community within WBS to ensure that you have the best possible student experience. This means that we seek student feedback to represent and include student voice in the continuous development of the Undergraduate Programme. We also organise community enrichment activities, have links to WBS- affiliated societies, manage a suite of scholarships and the Associate Dean’s Fund, and support Personal and Senior Tutors with student pastoral care. You get the impression; we’re a busy team! We’ve also been working on your forthcoming Welcome Week and we can’t wait for you to join us, whether you’re online or on campus.

Welcome Week is an exciting programme of events to help you get to grips with your studies at WBS, as well as making friendships and connections across our varied, global student and staff community. This year has been more complex than usual, as we’ve been faced with the ongoing pandemic, but we’re really pleased with the programme that we’re able to offer you.

The vast majority of our welcome events will be taking place online to uphold social distancing. Whereas for Foundation Year students Welcome Week will largely be in-person as you’re a very small cohort. You should be able to view all the different sessions on your Welcome Week calendar or by logging into the pre-arrival pages of my.wbs. We’re also offering special live sessions, including your ‘Welcome to WBS’ from the Dean of the School and the Undergraduate Programme Associate Dean on Tuesday 28 September.

For 1^st Year Students and Visiting Students, your Course Director will be also be delivering live Q&As online on my.wbs on either Tuesday 28 or Wednesday 29 September. There’ll also be a live WBS Societies Fair taking place online, the details for this event and joining details will be shared on my.wbs nearer the time. Make sure that you attend all the sessions so that you have all the key information about WBS and get the opportunity to ask any questions that you may have about your studies. Again, don’t forget to access all the pre-recorded virtual content online!

In addition to the online events, the SEE Team will be hosting a number of community events in-person and online throughout Welcome Week and beyond that will enable you to meet key members of undergraduate staff and your fellow students. If you want to join us for an event sign-up via these links: ice-cream, a WBS guided campus walk, geocaching, or speed networking event. Places are limited so sign up soon to avoid disappointment; we look forward to meeting you at these events very soon!

Your Welcome Week extends beyond activities and events at WBS, and you should check out the University of Warwick Welcome Week schedule to find out what’s arranged online and across campus.

Our biggest piece of advice? You’ll only have one Welcome Week so throw yourself into all the (many!) sessions that interest you. Look out for us at one of your online sessions or community events next week, and feel free to say ‘hi’ –we can’t wait to welcome you to WBS!

Gemma, Nicole, Isabel, Georgia, Liam and Lily

(WBS Student Experience and Engagement Team)