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| From the Dean of Students' Desk
 |
Ted Hoef |
Welcome to the fifth issue of the 2009-10 academic year for Staying Connected, a newsletter for parents of
first-year students.
By the time you are reading this, your son or daughter is in the process of starting his/her second semester at
the University as undergraduate classes resume on January 11. I hope you were able to spend some nice time together over the holiday break.
Emergency and Weather Alerts
I am writing this on a day on which we are on snow schedule,
meaning that the campus opened late at 10:00 a.m. due to snow overnight. Did you know that your student can sign up for our Webster Alerts
program to receive text and/or email messages regarding weather-related campus closings? Webster Alerts is a campus alerts service that
keeps you up-to-date on the latest campus information. Webster University has partnered with e2Campus to offer this service FREE to
students, faculty, and staff. Using this service, Webster sends out text messages and/or emails containing emergency announcements and
weather-related school closing information when necessary. Although optional, you are strongly encouraged to sign up for Webster Alerts. To
sign up, students can should go to this web page: http://www.webster.edu/technology/websteralerts/.
Career Services
Has your son or daughter utilized the terrific services offered by our
professionals in the Career Services department? If not, please encourage them to do so this semester. Some might think that the freshman
year is too early to begin using Career Services. Last year we had two consultants on campus, directors of the career centers at DePaul
University and Arcadia University. One of the main themes of their report was that students do not start using Career Services early
enough.
For freshman, the first year in college is the time to begin evaluating their values, interests, personality
characteristics and skills and identify how these relate to potential majors and careers.
- Enroll in core courses and identify academic areas and subjects that interest you.
- Preview the student catalog and review courses. Learn about the academic resources that
are available to you at Webster University.
- Create a plan by establishing academic goals and objectives.
- Identify activities that you enjoy, and try to incorporate at least one of these into your
academic and work life.
- Work in a part-time or volunteer position to gain career-related skills such as customer
service and communication skills, organizational abilities, teamwork, etc.
- Participate in programs offered by the Career Services office to learn more about different career fields.
- Utilize resources in the library to explore career information.
- Talk with people working in careers of interest to you.
- Utilize SIGI3, an on-line system of career information, for
additional skill and interest assessment, career exploration and job search planning; SIGI3 is
available through the Career Services website.
- If you are still exploring academic and career options, schedule an appointment with the Career Services
office for more information.
Students can contact the Career Services office by calling 314-968-6982 or 1-800-981-9805 and schedule an
appointment to:
- Discuss individual career concerns related to choice of major, choice of career field or career transition.
- Arrange to take career assessments which may assist students in identifying their interests and help them to
explore career options.
- Learn about resources which will help students to explore specific careers and obtain detailed information
about job tasks, employment outlook, etc.
Sign up for a free My Career Connections (MCC) account through the Career Services website,
http://www.webster.edu/careers/. MCC is an online database that allows students to search for
on and off-campus opportunities and keeps students up-to-date about Career Services events.
We hope to have another newsletter out to you in February. We’d love to get your suggestions for future articles.
Happy New Year!
Sincerely,
Ted Hoef, Ph.D.
Associate Vice President for Student Affairs and Dean of Students
hoeftl@webster.edu
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