At the University of Evansville, they tend to try and get the international freshmen in and settled before the other students arrive and school starts.
I arrived on Monday the 12th of August along with a few other international students, others arrived on the Tuesday and Wednesday, before the beginning of International Orientation on Wednesday night, where we would have a welcome dinner. Over Tuesday and Wednesday, before the orientation properly began, they had set shuttle buses to take us to target, and put on activities in the evening and through the day.
International Orientation kicked off with a welcome dinner, where us international students were placed in four groups, blue, red, green and yellow, with two International Orientation Leaders each. These were small groups for us to take part in some of the activities with. At the welcome dinner, we met the president of the university, dean of students, as well as some other important members of the faculty. It was also a good opportunity to meet some of the other international students who were going through the same thing as myself.
The dinner ended with dancing and games with the International Orientation Leaders, Orientation Leaders and international students.
On Thursday, most the internationals had to take a English and Math test. Fortunately I was able to get out of both as I am only in Evansville for the year and English is my first language, and the Math test is for students who want to take classes in Maths. After this, we had talks and information sessions with the International Orientation Leaders, before the evening where we took part in a 'mini Olympics'.
The Olympics were good fun, the leaders had put together a few different games for us to do. The first being musical chairs, which I got out of very quickly! We then played a noughts and crosses type game but with running and cloths! In teams, we had to try and be the first to get three of our colour cloths in a row by running back and forth and tagging another teammate to place the next cloth. We then played a couple games of dodgeball, then finished with a balloon game. In two big teams, we had to run into a large square, try and pop the balloon then run back and tag then next person. The catch being that the way you had to pop the balloon was to sit on it, it was brilliant!
Friday was the last day of International Orientation, which we had other talks and sessions with the leaders, and finished with bowling and pizza at the bowling ally in Evansville. It was good fun and very competitive, but unfortunately my bowling skills aren't that great! :/
International Orientation was a great way for us to meet the other international students and familiarise ourselves with the campus a bit better. The leaders were also international students who were on their second, third or fourth year at Evansville. It was nice to have them lead us as they had been through the same thing, so knew what we were going through.