Reactions: What would you change about first year orientation?

Five of our newest writers take on what they perceive as the biggest problems with first year orientation and propose potential reforms for the years to come.

OA should become mandatory ‘small-group experience’

Sabir Seth, Contributing Opinion Writer

In conversations with first-year students, a recurring theme has been a tangible dissatisfaction with Community Action (CA) and Dialogue and Difference in Action (DDA) Orientation small-group experiences. The programs largely failed to make good on their promises of cultivating relationships and opportunities for “service” and “civic engagement.” Only Outdoor Action (OA), it seemed, held true to the goals it set out for itself.

Next year, Princeton should offer OA as the singular small-group experience, featuring both an on-campus and off-campus option.

During overnight outings, the aspect of ‘forced proximity’ within small groups, which is so integral to OA and yet so absent in other groups, makes the quality of relationships built during OA excursions all the more meaningful. Being stuck with a group for four days with little to no privacy and a constant uphill struggle (quite literally) compels you to embrace the awkward, and, more importantly, discourages social withdrawal.

On the contrary, in CA groups like mine, events only ran until 6 p.m., after which time we drifted our separate ways. For on-campus groups in particular, with the convenience of retreating to dorms ever-present, there is hardly time for building deep-seated connections.

Finally, the divorce from technology and campus that OA provides, which offers students a reset and relief, is critical. In the academic burrow of Princeton, where screens are inescapable and we are constantly stormed by preprofessional stressors, we should all experience a time away from our devices before that is all we know for the next four years.

The value that OA offers is unmatched by CA and DDA. It’s high time that Princeton made it mandatory.

Sabir Seth ’29 is a prospective Computer Science major from San Ramon, Calif. He can be reached at ss6976[at]princeton.edu.

CA fails to live up to its ideals

Ravin Bhatia, Contributing Opinion Writer

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Upon learning this summer that I would be participating in Community Action (CA), I was ecstatic. It felt like the perfect extension of the volunteering that marked my time in high school. My group’s theme, Refugee Services, seemed especially pertinent amid the rising inflammatory political discourse about immigrants during the second Trump Administration.

But CA was hardly what it advertised itself to be.

My group was dropped off at a low-income housing site about 10 minutes from Central Park. We spent the next hour with a local food justice organization packing bags with pantry goods, knocking on doors, and offering meals to whomever answered. However, by the end, we had only served seven families in a complex with roughly 50 apartments.

We spent the next three days touring the Museum of the City of New York, doing team building activities at the St. John Paul II Youth Retreat Center in Newark, and grabbing boba and meals. Beyond our first day, the trip included no acts of service whatsoever. What had been advertised as an immersive experience spent fulfilling Princeton’s informal motto was essentially a four-day retreat with community service as a feature, rather than the focus.

I’m tremendously grateful for the friendships I made across those four days. But my CA experience was nevertheless disappointing.

CA must be redesigned and rethought. Service activities, with ample opportunities for reflection, should be incorporated every day of the trip. Partnerships with community organizations should be deepened, and opportunities for students to continue their work throughout the school year should be provided.

This is a university whose guiding vision is service in the world. If all we do during a service-centered trip feels performative and minimal, does that vision still ring true?

Ravin Bhatia ’29 is an Opinion writer from Brookline, Mass. He is a prospective SPIA major on a pre-law track, and can be reached at rb8448[at]princeton.edu.

If everything is “mandatory,” nothing is mandatory

Ian Kuo, Contributing Opinion Writer

First-year Orientation lasts for what feels like a century. The most frustrating part of Orientation is the meaningless busywork that underpins the entire experience.

There are, of course, main events of the Orientation experience: the long meetings with zee groups, the overwhelming entire-class social events like the ice cream social, and the Orientation trips that monopolize most students’ mental bandwidths. But there are also monotonous information sessions devoid of any true meaning.

Programming like the pre-read discussion, the alcohol training, and the academic honesty sessions are forgotten as soon as they are completed — and they often go uncompleted. How many of your friends read Dean Gordin’s book this summer? Orientation events, which are all “mandatory,” fall along a spectrum of “mandatory-ness.”

The University should take this to heart: When so many students already skip events, adding new ones and calling them “mandatory” will only make old events feel less so. And the mass of irrelevant events punishes those who follow the rules and attend them while rewarding those who are choosier about what to participate in.

Next year, the University should be more intentional about what they require first-years to complete. Slim down the number of events, and actually enforce attendance with punishments for students who don’t complete the programming. The University needs to recognize that some events, which they believe are in the best interest for the new students, are disliked and avoided, and without any external pressure, just won’t be completed. If Princeton believes so strongly in their Orientation program, they need to be willing to back it up.

Ian Kuo ’29 is an Opinion writer from Davidson, N. C. He is a prospective History major and can be reached at ik5195[at]princeton.edu.

Not every talk needs to be a full hour

Noah Gezahegn, Contributing Opinion Writer

Sitting through hours of talks during first-year Orientation, I couldn’t help but notice lots of people around me dozing off or scrolling on their phones. Over our 10-day Orientation, we sat through several hour-long lectures on topics ranging from academic success to scholarly integrity. While these topics may be important, the sessions often regurgitated information already covered in training course modules or could have been effectively conveyed in less than 30 minutes.

There are two ways we can resolve this problem. First, the University could guarantee that all talks and lectures are less than an hour long. A three-hour lecture on “How to Thrive at Princeton” would be more effective if it was slashed to one hour and didn’t repeat information included in summer programming. If talks weren’t so repetitive and obscenely long, students might actually pay attention and retain information. Cutting unnecessary programming would also give first-years more time to explore campus and meet new people outside of University-sponsored events.

Orientation programming should also adopt dynamic, multimedia presentation styles to keep students engaged. A high point of Orientation was the Sexual Harassment/Assault Advising, Resources and Education play, which navigated a serious topic in an interesting, engaging, and entertaining way. During the play, there wasn’t a phone in sight. The crowd demonstrated their engagement through laughter and gasps as the plot developed. While it’s not feasible to turn all Orientation programming into theatrical productions, finding creative ways to keep students engaged beyond simple lectures would surely result in a better Orientation experience.

Noah Gezahegn ’29 is an Opinion writer from Roxbury, N.J.. He is a prospective Neuroscience major and can be reached at ng5372[at]princeton.edu.

Panic! At the course signups

Audrey Tan, Contributing Opinion Writer

Princeton should reduce the time spent on scheduled icebreakers and CORE events, prioritizing helping students adjust to the school curriculum and figure out their course schedules.

During the frantic course registration process, my friend lamented, “Why didn’t we do this sooner instead of randomly going out to the woods?” Several of my friends stayed up all night just so they could have the perfect schedule arranged at 9 a.m. on Aug. 26.

Although initially confident, I was shaken to learn that most math courses required a diagnostic test which was worth a non-negligible percentage of the final grade. As someone who had not taken calculus since junior year, I feverishly studied for six hours. When I attempted to go to the McGraw Center for help, I was told that tutoring wasn’t available yet. In an alarming change of pace, I went from hiking on CA to cramming, blindly navigating a complicated departmental bureaucracy.

If Princeton is truly committed to helping students adjust, they should implement more sessions that train students on how various courses actually work and host review sessions for classes that begin with diagnostic tests. Although Orientation already has academically-focused lectures, they are insufficiently detailed, talking in sweeping and unhelpful generalities. If Princeton instead dedicated entire days to specific departmental orientation, potentially even with professors hosting “mock classes” and sharing — and raising awareness about existing — preparatory problem sets, first-years would feel far more prepared to start classes. Social navigation is important, but Orientation programming must be adjusted to ensure that academics don’t get neglected.

Audrey Tan ‘29 is an opinion writer from Pullman, Wash. She is a prospective Economics major on a pre-law track and can be reached at at4887[at]princeton.edu.