Buccaneer Family Night encouraged children of ETSU faculty and staff to attend the university and make them aware of the opportunities and benefits they could receive.
Taking place in Reece Museum on Nov. 27, faculty and staff brought their family members that are considering making ETSU their academic home.
Nicole Martin, who is the assistant director of admissions and Welcome Center coordinator, explains that this event aims to inform students about what is available to them because of their parent or guardian’s connection to the university.
“Buccaneer Family Night is specifically for faculty and staff of ETSU and their dependents to come and get a head start on knowing what the admissions process is like and knowing about dual enrollment opportunities,” Martin said. “We’ll have the bursar talk about the forms that are available online for students.”
In order to give students a wide range of information, many offices that are involved in the enrollment process were present and ready to take and answer questions.
“We have different offices here,” Martin said “Scholarships, housing, honors, advisement, financial aid and admissions offices to meet with the students and tell them all about the different opportunities.”
The university has been organizing the event for multiple years now in the hopes that families affiliated with ETSU will be better informed of the benefits available to them.
“This is the fourth year we’re doing this,” Martin said. “We started in 2015. We expect around 13 families to come tonight, and that’s about average.”
Along with giving students and families the opportunity to talk individually with people from different offices, they also got information from a presentation explaining things like dual enrollment, financial aid and how to enroll as a freshman or transfer student.
“The presentation will go over all the different offices that are here,” Martin said. “We’ll go over the whole admissions process.”
By coming to this event, upcoming students were informed on different opportunities they have if they choose to attend ETSU. They also gained knowledge about how to adequately prepare for college and ways they can be helping themselves now for the future.
ETSU President Brian Noland spoke during the presentation and gave some words of wisdom to any student thinking about attending ETSU.
“We invest in you as freshmen,” Noland said. “I tell students all the time that if all you do is go to class and come back home, you’ve missed it. Be engaged in the life of the institution. You can come to this university and be anything you want.”
