{"id":2580,"date":"2025-08-05T16:15:16","date_gmt":"2025-08-05T20:15:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/?p=2580"},"modified":"2025-08-05T16:15:16","modified_gmt":"2025-08-05T20:15:16","slug":"welcome-families-of-first-gen-students","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/welcome-families-of-first-gen-students\/","title":{"rendered":"Welcome Families of First-Gen Students!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Starting college can bring a mix of emotions for first-generation families: excitement, nervousness, pride, and uncertainty. That\u2019s all normal. In just a few weeks, your student will begin learning how to manage a new environment: living with a roommate, navigating a new class schedule, handling increased independence, and figuring out where they belong on campus. The first few weeks of the semester are about exploration, and it may take time for your student to find a routine. Please encourage your student to try new things like attending a program in their residence hall, checking out the Involvement Fair, or grabbing a meal with a classmate. How you can support your student in the first few weeks of school:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Encourage your student to attend campus welcome events and orientation sessions.<\/li>\n<li>Remind them it\u2019s okay to ask for help. There are people here who want to support them.<\/li>\n<li>Send an encouraging message during the first week of classes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>OWU Sponsoring Organization\/Office:<\/strong>\u00a0Bishop Elevate, First-Generation Student Success<br \/>\n<strong>Contact:<\/strong>\u00a0Thea Smekens at\u00a0<a href=\"mailto:tjsmekens@owu.edu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">tjsmekens@owu.edu<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Starting college can bring a mix of emotions for first-generation families: excitement, nervousness, pride, and uncertainty. That\u2019s all normal. In just a few weeks, your student will begin learning how to manage a new environment: living with a roommate, navigating a new class schedule, handling increased independence, and figuring out where they belong on campus. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2100,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[88],"tags":[527,490,204,602,603,266,22],"class_list":["post-2580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-parent-family-engagement","tag-bishop-elevate","tag-first-generation","tag-first-gen","tag-first-year","tag-navigating","tag-student-success","tag-support"],"blocksy_meta":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2580","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2100"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2580"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2581,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2580\/revisions\/2581"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sites.owu.edu\/newsforowufamilies\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}