Freshman year is the start of all new beginnings that can be overwhelming. Interacting alongside peers eases the transition into all of the exciting opportunities available to utilize during the first year of your college experience.
Living and learning communities give first- year students the opportunity to correlate between classes and aspects of their social life throughout the course of their experience at Cabrini College.
“I loved the aspect of being in an LLC. At first it was a little intimidating, however, the people who are within your LLC become your core group of friends throughout your four years, especially as a strong support system the first few months going into college,” Amber Dietrich, junior social work major, said.
The LLC programs allow students to work with their core group of friends to find a balance between homework assignments and other activities without getting stressed.
This fall 2015 semester, the new body language LLC assists students who are stressed. First year students in the body language LLC will consider issues relating to body image and how the media impacts how we perceive others and ourselves.
The body language LLCs, along with other LLCs, will kick the year off with a retreat where students will develop communication skills and try to discover who they are as a first-year student in order to be successful.
Other co–curricular activities that students in the body language LLC will participate in include a pumpkin-patch trip in order to help students relieve stress and also a trip to the Bryn Mawr art ability exhibit to view and learn about disabled artists’ work that has been curated from around the world.
“The body language LLC is focused on body image but not the very traditional focus on eating disorders and image because it also focuses on self care,” Dr. Michelle Filling–Brown, Faculty Director of the body language living and learning community, said.
Students in this LLC will be able to collaborate with their peers and their master-learner, an upper-class mentor or tutor, in finding a balance between school and their work lives as well as in overcoming problems with anxiety so that students can enjoy their college experience.
Sophomore students sometimes head into the school year stressed and overwhelmed because they are still unsure of what they want to pursue. The LLC program has recognized that problem and has launched the first sophomore IMPACT leadership LLC this fall 2015 semester, which is an extension of the freshman leadership LLC.
Sophomores in the leadership LLC reside in the newly renovated Dixon house while freshman students in LLC’s live in Xavier or East.
For the first time in Cabrini’s history, freshman students not in an LLC program this year have the chance to reconsider that opportunity and think about how that might impact their sophomore year.
“We have more first year students in an LLC this year then ever before,” Richard Gebauer, Director of First Year Experience, said.
“New LLC’s this semester have continued to grow and move forward in the direction of reaching the goal of 100 percent of undergraduate students in a LLC by 2020,” Gebauer said.
