Auburn is having its biggest Welcome Week ever, bringing free food and fun to campus for new and returning students of all types from Aug.13-23.
"Welcome Week is longer this year than it has ever been," said Welcome Week advisor John-Michael Roehm. "We extended the number of days and with that we have included a larger number of events that are going to be taking place. Right now, I believe the count is around 115 plus events that are planned between Aug. 13-23, in the traditional Welcome Week time."
The biggest innovation to this year's events is the social media platform Guidebook, which allows users to preview events before they attend, with customizable event checklists and alarms to notify users before events.
"The neat thing about Guidebook is it allows students to filter through the 115 events," Roehm said. "(Welcome Week) can seem a bit overwhelming and there's a lot of different things going on, so we made different categories for events."
Among the different categories of events are those designed for new students, returning students, graduate students and international students, events.
The social media platform is available for free on most smartphones.
A web-friendly version of Guidebook is available through a link on the committee's website, www.auburn.edu/welcomeweek.
This is the first time Welcome Week has gone with an electronic-only event guide, and the funding normally reserved for printed fliers has been used to enhance other events, according to Welcome Week assistant director Matt Smith.
"Guidebook has been used in the past," Smith said. "The University wanted to try it out a few years ago so we decided we're going to keep pushing that, So many people are using their phones nowadays for everything. I know a lot of people, myself included, who have their schedules in their phones. It makes it a lot easier to take it with you and have something on your person at all times."
Though this is the first time the University has openly used Guidebook to help promote its events, past semesters have seen various clubs and organizations use it to facilitate their programs.
"In Camp War Eagle, they actually make incoming freshmen download the Guidebook app just to stay in touch with certain things," Smith said.
Smith said the requirement simplifies things for the Welcome Week staff,
"It makes it easier for us since they're required to download it."
Smith said the total number of students who have downloaded the Welcome Week event schedule on Guidebook has exceeded 2,000, and it is steadily rising.
The swelling number of students participating in the events this year can partially be attributed to the diverse number of colleges, organizations and clubs who have taken it upon themselves to welcome students in their own way.
Past Welcome Week committees have been plagued by misinformation or miscommunication, something Welcome Week Director Megan Eldridge is determined to change.
"We really try to let people know that this is not just for freshman and that it's for everyone," Eldridge said. "This year, other than having 'Freshman Food and Fun,' which is only for freshmen at the president's house, we try to say that it is for returning students too, because that gets lost a bunch of times. It's for everyone."
Eldridge said she arrived during the enrollment boom of 2011 and had to live off campus her freshman year, which limited her interaction with other freshmen.
On a whim, Eldridge and her roommates went to Casino Night because it offered free food.
"It was a little weird, just being on campus with all those people was kind of overwhelming," Eldridge said. "Casino Night was something where I met a lot of new people and I met a lot of my friends. It was a really big deal for me because I didn't know anybody here at Auburn and coming to that, I met people I still know to this day."
Welcome Week will continue until Saturday, Aug. 23, with multiple events happening every day.
For questions about event times or categories, consult the Auburn University Welcome Week 2014 guide in Guidebook or the Welcome Week website, www.auburn.edu/welcomeweek for details.
"I think if I hadn't gone to Welcome Week and met these people I wouldn't have done as much as I do now," Eldridge said.
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