Sept. 3, 2017, marks the first day of this year’s Orientation Week at Wilfrid Laurier University.
This year’s schedule is filled with entertainment to welcome new students and welcome back returning upper-years.
Wilfrid Laurier University Students’ Union has aimed this year to “strike a balance between both social programming and different sessions to help [students] succeed within their academics and student life at Laurier,” said Anthony Tomizza, vice-president of Programming and Services for the Students’ Union.
The Students’ Union has focused on filling the O-Week schedule with quality programming for students.
“We’ve focused a lot on feedback we have received from past orientation weeks and tried to focus on what these first years are looking for,” Tomizza said.
The Students’ Union has taken away some events that have shown less engagement with students in the past – such as the game show and talent night – in order to spread out the most popular events throughout the whole week.
This year, the Head Phone Disco and the A-Team Concert will take place on separate nights to ensure students are able to attend both, as opposed to previous years where both events occurred on the same night. The Head Phone Disco will take place on the Tuesday and the A-Team Concert featuring Desiigner will take place on the Thursday. The concert is open to all Laurier students.
“[The concert] will be on the Thursday this year so hopefully more upper year students will be around to attend that as well,” Tomizza said. “As a Students’ Union welcome back to all students and [also a] welcome to new [students].”
Other larger events will also continue to take place, including Shinerama on Saturday, hypnotist Wayne Hoffman on Friday night and closing ceremonies on Saturday night.
“We’ve spread out the typical programming we’ve had in the past and just ensured that we’re providing those opportunities for students to have something fun and exciting to do every night of orientation week that is engaging for them,” Tomizza said.
This year the Students’ Union have also introduced some new events. Thursday afternoon features the Waterloo Fest event where students are invited to Uptown Square where there will be live performers, vendors and local businesses.
“This is the first time we’re having an event partnered with the University of Waterloo as well as the City of Waterloo in Uptown Square,” Tomizza said.
Students’ Union has also gone a different direction this year by introducing a wellness program, called “Positive Pulse.”
Positive Pulse will not only focus on mental health but also physical health. The Students’ Union has partnered with different partners on campus and the athletics department to highlight resources available to students, including Zumba and Yoga classes for O-Week participants.
“[There’s] sessions on how physical activity can affect your mood and how you perform academically, tying together all of the resources on campus to make sure students know how to live a happy lifestyle in their undergrad,” Tomizza said.
“Along with highlighting important mental health topics and resources on campus,” Tomizza said.
Each night of O-Week highlights a different event to keep students entertained. The full schedule can be found on the Students’ Union website.