1- Peer Mentoring by Jenny

Peer mentors can have such a huge effect on a student's first year at a university. I personally did not have a formal peer mentor my freshman year and there were definite times I wish I had. It was nerve wracking trying to navigate around a campus I knew little to nothing about. I feel like a peer mentor is someone who has experience at the school and is someone who can answer all types of questions, whether that be academic or personal life questions. I love the idea of students helping and guiding other students, I feel it can reach a more personal level than that with a teacher. WIth a teacher you might not always feel comfortable asking them "what do I do if my boyfriend broke up with me" or scenarios similar to that.

I am a very open and easy-going person, which I think will help with being a peer mentor. I love meeting new people and building new friendships. I also like helping people through their own problems, I actually hope to make a living someday by doing this. Throughout high school and college I have helped talk friends through heartbreak, family issues, panic attacks, bad grades... you name it, I probably helped someone trucker through it!

Some areas I need to improve in would be, time management and  planning group activities. I want to get better with my time management before giving advice to new students about it. I would hate to come off hypocritical to my mentees.

I hope my students have fun and take away a lot from our mentoring sessions. I hope to make them feel comfortable here at NAU and make their transition as easy as possible. Some challenges I could see happening would be time conflicts with dance, but I hope I will be able to minimize these possible conflicts as smoothly as I can.

Overall I am excited for this upcoming year, getting to know all of you and all the students next fall!