When You Return

Welcome back to returning students! We hope that you found your off-campus study to be both educationally rewarding and very enjoyable. As you probably realize, the experience is not yet over: during your "reentry" to the U.S. and Bowdoin, you will continue to come to grips with how your intellectual and personal life has changed. Below you will find advice on what to expect in the various stages of that process, how you can continue to learn about the culture and topics that you have been exploring, and how you might pass on some of your knowledge and experience to the campus as a whole. Some activities will be facilitated by the OCS Office; some will need you to take the initiative to meet your own individual needs and goals.

Reentry. As you have heard from us before, and probably from your program, students commonly go through an adjustment phase upon return to the U.S. and their home campus. You may find that what was once familiar now feels strange or flat, compared with the environment you came to know so well. Family and friends might find it hard to comprehend quite how your experiences affected you, or they might not even seem to have time to listen. It is not possible to predict from the location, type or duration of your study away whether you will experience such feelings, though some temporary difficulty is often a sign of how thoroughly you adjusted to your new environment. You probably went through a similar phase in your first few weeks away, and you might find it useful to recall the techniques you used then. Remember that much of what you are experiencing is a natural part of your acquisition of new skills such as the ability to adapt and show flexibility in unfamiliar surroundings. Most people readjust in a few weeks at most. Remember that if you find yourself in a rocky patch the staff of the Counseling Service, who are very experienced in dealing with this, are available to assist you. The OCS Office's Welcome Back booklet also addresses this question; and you might find useful the Reentry Toolkit (PDF) that SIT Study Abroad and World Learning have kindly made generally available.

Program evaluation. We would like you to assess the value of your experience, for your own benefit and that of others. A few days before your return to Bowdoin, we will ask you to complete our on-line program evaluation form; you will simply need to enter your Bowdoin user name and password to access it. We hope that filling out and submitting the evaluation form will allow you to offer constructive advice and a useful summary of your experience for students and faculty. Please do this as soon as possible while your off-campus study experience is still fresh in your mind. Our collection of evaluations is extremely important both for students researching their options and for Bowdoin in deciding what are the strongest and most appropriate programs to place on the options list. If none of that persuades you, remember that you signed an agreement to complete an evaluation as one of Bowdoin's requirements for participation in off-campus study.

Welcome Back Dinner. You are cordially invited to a buffet dinner for all students returning from off-campus study. For students returning this spring, the dinner will be in Daggett Lounge, Thorne Hall at 5:45 PM on Monday, 19 January (the first day of classes, and Martin Luther King Day). Staff from OCS and other Bowdoin offices will be there to answer your questions and say a few words about the reentry process. And then the dinner is always a lot of fun, and a great opportunity to enjoy some delicious food while sharing experiences with other students who have been away all over the world. RSVP (regrets only).

Integration of your study away into your learning at Bowdoin. Consider applying what you learned in an honors project or independent study, or in other connected courses. Look out for related lectures, exhibits, and performances. Search out international films, TV programming, and publications in Bowdoin's Library and Language Media Center. If you kept a journal, continue to use it to articulate your changing perspectives. Meet students from where you studied, or gain other international viewpoints, through the International Club.

Share your experience with the rest of campus. Find outlets to discuss your experience with others; many students report that this was an excellent way to process what they learned and deepen their understanding of its complexity. You can expect invitations from us to participate in discussion and information meetings, in the residential houses and elsewhere, for returning students and those considering study away in various programs and countries. In the fall semester, we will be especially grateful for volunteers for our Parents Weekend Panel. And of course there are several language tables that you may want to join or rejoin.

Credit transfer. Programs return sealed transcripts to Bowdoin's Office of the Registrar. In most cases students receive their own copy, but the sealed copy is necessary for credit transfer. At the Registrar's Office counter in Moulton Union, you can ask if yours has been received. As long as you met the program's requirements for release of your transcript (e.g., coursework completed, bills paid, release form signed), all should go smoothly. Do not be surprised, however, if your transcript does not arrive until well into the Bowdoin semester, especially if you took university courses, whose grades usually take longer to be reported. Contact your program directly if there is urgency about receiving a transcript for graduation or a scholarship application. It will take a few more days for the credit to be processed at Bowdoin before it is posted on Bearings. For credit toward the major (or minor), you should also check with your academic department about courses that they provisionally approved at the time of your application; to help your advisors make their final decision, remember to hold on to all assignments, syllabi, course descriptions, etc.

Photo Competition. Our annual photo competition will be judged in October, but we accept and post entries on our website at any time. Nowadays most students take digital images, but if you didn't we can scan your prints ourselves. Anyone who took pictures (who didn't?) should consider submitting their favorite three images -- it is a great way of sharing your experience with the rest of the campus. Email your three entries (in JPG) to us, or send us prints for scanning. We will accept entries through September.

After graduation. Think seriously about the opportunities opened up by your experience, from scholarships such as the Watson, Fulbright, Marshall or Rhodes, to international work in business or an organization like the Peace Corps. Talk to faculty and Student Fellowships and Research advisors early, before deadlines sneak past you.