SOAR core part of freshman recruiting, so why are hosts hard to find
Overnight stays play a large role in the recruitment of prospective students, enough so that many Rice University students can remember who hosted them as prospective students or can trace their decision to come to Rice back to when they stayed overnight. If this is the case, why is it so difficult to find hosts for overnight programs at Rice, like Vision and SOAR?
As a two-year member of the Minority Interest Committee, I have had to publicize and recruit for Seeking Opportunities at Rice, our fall program, and Vision, the larger spring program. In recruiting hosts for SOAR this year, I have tried almost everything, from appealing to college competition by reminding Brown College that we have had the most hosts in previous years to telling people about free dinner this Saturday night. Even with Facebook posts, mass emails and lunch announcements spread across all of the colleges, MIC has still had trouble finding enough hosts for the 60 students arriving at Rice this weekend for SOAR.
When people tell me they cannot host, I usually hear the same reasons: "I'm too busy this weekend" or "I don't even know where they would sleep." While I understand that as Rice students, we are all busy, I also understand that as Rice students, we are all busy. I am sure that for most people who tell me they are too busy to host, there are other people just as busy who are signing up. And although someone may think before signing up that there is not enough time, when prospies actually come, there are usually activities planned for them, so hosting is not as big a time commitment as most people seem to think it is.
Even if the time commitment turns out to be substantial, it should not really be enough to prevent people from hosting. Every one of us decided to come to Rice for a reason, and hosting is a chance to share that with someone. Students should recall that someone probably hosted them before they came to Rice, which means they were probably influenced positively by that experience. Students should want to share that experience with someone else. Hearing my host talk about Orientation Week and Beer Bike on my visit and listening to all his friends as they talked about Rice's great community was a great experience. Programs like Vision and SOAR are a great way to serve the Rice community by ensuring as many people as possible know about our school and why we chose it. MIC's programs are especially important because they diversify the student body, making Rice the multicultural community we know. If not for that diversity, Rice would miss out on the many experiences students from underrepresented minorities bring to our campus and the added perspective they bring to all activities at Rice.
So yes, most students are probably pretty busy this weekend. But that does not mean they cannot introduce a prospie to Rice. Students can still show prospies their colleges and have them meet their friends. And as hosts, students might even make friends they will see next year as freshmen. So I will ask students the question I have been asking people for the past month: "Are you hosting for SOAR?"
Students can sign up to host for SOAR at http://tinyurl.com/k57nd2z.
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