After months of discussion and a week promoting its primary objective, the Student Success Office (SSO) officially opened to staff, students and faculty on Friday, October 28. University of Waterloo President Feridun Hamdullahpur made a speech alongside Director Sean Van Koughnett and invited an attendee to cut the ceremonial cake. Throughout the afternoon, SSO employees donned colourful SSO shirts and gave tours of the office to those who took a visit.
The SSO is located on the second floor of South Campus Hall across from Festival Fare, replacing where the Office of Development and Alumni Affairs was located until August. The room has been completely redesigned and decorated with bold coloured lines denoting where people are in the office, reflective of the university’s colourful design scheme riddled with coat-of-arms-inspired chevrons. The office is split into four subunits, each aimed at a different focus of the SSO: Learning Services, Communications & Research, Student Innovation and Student Experience.
The Learning Services unit, labelled in engineering purple, houses the Writing Centre, the English Language Proficiency Program, academic advisors and success coaching. This unit will help undergraduate and graduate students with academic issues and guidance. In the Writing Centre, certified professional tutors will provide assistance to students who want to improve the clarity of their writing for free.
The Communications & Research unit, labelled in math pink, houses the social media and student communication outlet of the university. The @uwaterloo account on Twitter runs from here as well as other official Waterloo social media accounts. The primary goal of this unit is to make it easier for students to figure out information concerning the university and how to communicate with others on campus.
The Student Innovation unit, labelled in AHS teal, houses the VeloCity head office and the Student Technology Team, a team of three co-ops and a manager who will be making apps “for students by students”. The SSO claimed the types of applications made by the team are to be determined, but it is probable that it will be at the whims of the manager and students to decide what they will be working on that term. It is also possible that other departments could request their assistance in making apps for them.
The Student Experience unit, labelled in arts orange, houses the Student Development programs, the International Student Office, upper-year support and the First Year Experience program, which includes the Student Life Office, which is responsible for Orientation Week and Student Life 101, among other events. The subsections of this unit are primarily derived from units that had existed previously on campus in different buildings, but are brought together to cooperatively study student engagement at the university.
The units together aim to form a unified location for student information and success research, to see how to improve student engagement and retention rates. While it may seem like the SSO is a fresh coat of paint on old departments, the combination of these departments should make it easier for students to figure out what’s happening on campus and how to get through their academic programs more smoothly.
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