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Every year we work hard and put in many hours to recruit freshmen to our group. There are the club fairs, opening week events, hours that go into tabling and everything else those first few weeks of the fall semester entail. And it’s definitely important that we spend that time and energy, but we often ignore students who are new to our campus in the spring semester – mid-termers.
I remember my first year working to start a college ministry at SUNY Geneseo. We had a group of 6-8 students and we could see momentum starting to build. One of our students knew of a girl from his high school who was going to transfer to Geneseo in the spring and he talked to us about getting her involved in the ministry.
We were able to connect with her early on, and even though she was still a fairly new Christian, she got plugged in and eventually became a student leader. Years later she came to work for BASIC and is now influencing students of her own on a campus in the Syracuse, NY area. Unfortunately, it isn’t that easy for most students who come in the middle of the year.
Every year there is a number of students who choose to start somewhere new in the spring, but they don’t get the same experience as those who came in the fall. Less attention is paid to transfer orientation, rooming them with someone who is a good fit or putting on opening week events that will help them feel welcome.
With that in mind here are a couple ways that you can work to reach mid-termers come January.
Transfer student reception
See if your ministry can somehow be represented at the transfer student reception. Most colleges want to encourage students to connect with something and get involved. If you can’t have a physical presence maybe you can provide a small gift that can get in the hands of each student.
If neither of those ideas work out, then you could still look to table near events planned for transfer students. Which brings me to my next point…
Recommit yourself to tabling
You may have tabled regularly to start the fall semester, but as life got crazy and students got busy your tabling trailed off. Make yourself visible outside of dining halls during mealtimes, at the gym or in the student union. If transfer students can’t see you, it’s possible they won’t even know you exist.
Create a welcome kit
You may have done something like this before for freshman move in. Put together kits with menus to local restaurants, snacks (bags of popcorn and granola bars work well) and things for laundry like a roll of quarters and detergent. Then ask the student life office if you can get a list of all transfer students and deliver it to them somehow.
Be a friend
In many ways, the experience of transfer students is probably like that of the kid who joined your fourth grade class in January when their parents moved to the area for work. If you weren’t a transfer student, just think back to how alone you might have felt at the beginning of college and then consider that mid-termers come in after a lot of friendships have already been established.
I’ve read before that to be in a place where you don’t have friends is like being on a deserted island. That’s a lonely place to be and unfortunately, it’s what many experience when they first come to college. It can be hard to make new friends, and yet, friendship is an easy way to make someone feel cared for and opens the door for you to share the Gospel.
So, I want to encourage you as January approaches to look for ways you can serve a new group of people in your ministry this year. You have a great opportunity to make someone feel welcome in a new place and to be a friend to those who are in need of one.
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