The Race to Finish: Constructing a New Summer Program for Incoming Freshmen

Abstract

In fall 2013, the Office of Summer and Winter Programs at the University of Connecticut (UConn) was charged by the Office of the Provost with creating a new, intensive summer program designed specifically for incoming freshmen and transfer students, to run for the first time the following summer. The program, under the name UConn First Summer, was intended to achieve two primary purposes: to offer incoming students a head start on their academic work and, no less significantly, to immerse them in a campus experience aimed at building college skills. This paper outlines the process of building the program, leading up to the resulting program launch in July 2014. The paper lays out the various pieces of this process, including marketing, curriculum development, and event and activity planning. A significant part of the paper discusses how each stage of the program build required addressing a range of challenges, resulting primarily from institutional obstacles and the compressed time line for the program’s creation.