Geneseo Admissions interns attend NYSACAC Conference
Photo Courtesy of Grace Terhune
On Saturday, Sept. 12, myself and Eduardo Imbert—a fellow intern in the Office of Admissions—had the opportunity to attend a Student Leaders in Admissions conference held by the New York State Association for College Admissions Counselors. Our supervisor, Makenna Youngs, Eduardo, and I hit the road at six in the morning to make our way to Albany, New York. Thankfully, with great conversation and a caffeine stop, the three and a half hour drive flew by.
The conference was hosted by Russell Sage College and Albany School of Pharmacy and Health Sciences. We connected with other tour guides and admissions counselors from different colleges in New York including Marist University, Nazareth University, SUNY Polytechnic Institution, and Le Moyne College.
This conference was a great opportunity for student leaders to learn about how other colleges and universities admissions offices operate. The first session we attended detailed ways to keep tour guides at the top of their game. While the information was intended for admissions related situations, the lessons can be applied to anyone in a leadership position that requires managing people. For instance, Aly Blair—an admissions counselor at Syracuse University—presented at this session, highlighting the importance of incentives for students to grow in their role; those incentives could be in the form of a paycheck, exclusive merch, or opportunities to be promoted within the company.
The second session we attended focused on social media content and how to improve your social media presence. For me, this session was the most intriguing because I create content and run The Lamron’s social media. The social media intern for Marist University’s ambassador program presented at this session and talked about her experience growing a social media account from the ground up.
We ended the conference with our Geneseo team hosting the mega session. We presented on how our office of admissions at Geneseo operates and how the tour guides transition into their roles after being appointed. Eduardo and I shared our experiences of being tour guides and interns at Geneseo. We shared how our roles as interns give us more opportunities to be involved in the office, with tasks like training new hires and working on logistics that are more behind the scenes. I shared that my favorite part of training a new tour guide was when they give me a tour; it is fun to be on the other side of it and ask questions like I do not already know the answer. It is also rewarding to know that you are helping a new tour guide learn the ropes and be a calming presence in what can often be a nerve wracking process.
If any current Geneseo students are interested in becoming a tour guide, just know that there are numerous opportunities to grow and develop your communication, organizational, and professional skills outside of just giving tours. I love my job and internship in the Office of Admissions and have been awarded a great deal of opportunities—like attending this conference—due to my hard work in and out of the office.
As we drove back to Geneseo, we discussed our key takeaways from the sessions we attended and looked forward to implementing them in our office. Stay tuned for some awesome social media content on the tour guides Instagram page, @sunygeneseotourguides.