New episode of NOVAinContext released: Orientation

It’s time for episode two of NOVA’s new podcast NOVAinContext! Episode two is about the importance of new student orientation. Find the episode on our NOVAinContext page on NOVAnet. Listen to the Orientation episode!

Who’s in? This episode features our co-hosts, Nate Carter and Lucy Williams, along with our experts, Mark and Mark—Mark Mannheimer and Mark Bumgarner who will discuss engaging students from the start of their time at NOVA, and helping to set them up for success.

• Mark Mannheimer is assistant director of onboarding success in NOVA’s Office of Student Affairs. Mark has worked at NOVA since 2008. He was originally hired as a Student Activities Counselor on the Annandale Campus. He subsequently went on to work with military & veteran students, international students and was the Annandale Campus lead for the GPS program, which provided orientation and early advising services to first-time students. Mark then transitioned to a role within Student Affairs focusing on new student and first-year services and supports—including SDV, NOVA’s college-success skills course. Mark is a Northern Virginia native and has spent most of his life living in the region except for a couple of years working at Florida State University prior to coming to NOVA.
• Mark Bumgarner is associate dean of student success at NOVA’s Woodbridge Campus. Prior to coming to NOVA, Mark worked for three years at George Mason University as an academic advisor and for 10 years at Marymount University as assistant director of the counseling and career center, which included overseeing new-student orientation. Mark has worked at NOVA for almost 25 years, providing academic advising and career counseling, as well as working on developing NOVA’s first orientation programs, facilitating an SDV-100 Redesign Project, and supporting the Transfer Working Group.

What’s next? A new episode of NOVAinContext will drop every two weeks during fall and spring semesters. Join us for this opportunity for faculty and staff to learn the how, what and why behind the college decisions and initiatives that affect them.

• Visit the NOVAinContext homepage where you will find a link to the orientation episode as well as our inaugural episode, AI in the Classroom. And, if you want to download it to listen later, there are step-by-step instructions for that, too.

Once you listen, we’d love to hear your feedback. Just email NOVAinContext@nvcc.edu. And if you have ideas for future topics, we want to hear those, too.

—Kathy Thompson, associate director of internal communications