Guest blogger: Ali Bloomston
Sometimes I wonder where I would be now if it were not for the NOLA Experience Orientation program. Would I have still met the people I consider my best friends? Would I be as involved on campus as I am now? Would I have felt as adjusted to Tulane and New Orleans? All I know is that participating in something as incredible as the NOLA Experience has completely shaped my undergraduate career at Tulane.
How can 5 days be so impactful? While NOLA is an orientation program, it is nothing like June orientation where the focus of the program is to properly acclimate students to beginning college and different services offered by Tulane. NOLA Experience is about acclimating students to the city of New Orleans, and fostering a passion for the city that is as important to the Tulane experience as what is learned in the classroom.
Through the NOLA Experience, rising freshman are assigned to "tracks" based on their interests. Each "track" presents a unique lens in which to view aspects of life in New Orleans. Tracks range from perspectives such as food, sports, music, community service, and nature--just to name a few. My freshman year I participated in a track called "Let the Good Times Rock and Roll" which focused on music in the Big Easy.
Probably my favorite aspect of the NOLA Experience is the people you meet. I can honestly say that more than half of my closest friends at Tulane I met during NOLA. A major perk of participating in this program a few days before school starts was that NOLA participants had such an advantage over students who move in for Welcome Week--we already had a strong support base and a feel for Tulane and the city. The bond that I formed with the other participants on my tracks still continues years later. Two of the girls on my track are my sorority sisters. I am about to room with a girl on my track for the second year in a row. Three guys in my track joined the same fraternity together. Two guys on my track joined the frisbee team together. Another two guys on my track become leaders in an organization called Roots of Music, which they found out about through our track programming. Two participants on my track dated for an entire year. Outside of my track, three other NOLA participants became my best friends at Tulane. NOLA Experience participants became student government senators, campus tour guides, student newspaper journalists, campus programming representatives, community service organization leaders, and 16 of us even became NOLA Experience Coordinators.
In addition to making lasting friendships with their peers, participants in the NOLA Experience also develop a powerful relationship with their Orientation Coordinators (OCs), upperclassmen who went through the NOLA Experience that are assigned to a specific track and organize programming and act as a mentor throughout and beyond NOLA. My NOLA OCs were two of the coolest people ever and made sure we knew all the ins-and-outs of Tulane. They constantly checked up on us throughout our freshman year and organized reunions so we could all get together and catch up. As a participant I knew how much having an upperclassmen mentor benefitted me, but it wasn't until I became an OC myself that I realized I got as much out of the relationship as participants did. My sophomore year I was the OC for a track called "Changemakers," a track that focused on social entrepreneurship in New Orleans, and I was surprised that even as an OC I became such good friends with so many of my participants. There is something about the NOLA Experience, as cheesy as it sounds, that truly brings people together.
