Ambassador program helped her 'gain confidence'
Issue date: 2/5/09 Section: News
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With the help of Winthrop's New Start program, 46-year-old Jennifer Mothersbaugh will receive her degree in mass communication this semester.
She's only six hours away from that degree and said working as an ambassador for the program has helped her.
"The ambassador program has...helped me gain confidence, develop friendships and gain a better understanding of the hard work it takes to recruit prospective students to the university," she said. "The admissions staff are very organized and highly professional, and they do a good job at the different events."
New Start is a program for "non-traditional students," or students who are more than 25 years old. The program helps these students with the admission process and then helps them adjust to college life, providing support and information.
"For older students, (the New Start program) is very helpful because of the encouragement and information we receive when we apply and attend the orientation session," Mothersbaugh said.
The program is also open to non-traditional transfer students, adults who want to continue undergraduate work and those who never began their college studies.
"(Non-traditional students) all have different stories," said Tracy Hudson, the program's admissions counselor, in a previous article. "Even though they have different life experiences, they face similar challenges."
Mothersbaugh said some of these challenges are the stress of family, jobs, school and household chores.
"Older students' primary focus is to get a degree as quickly as possible," she said. "We don't worry about adjusting to college life."
But she said knowing she and other non-traditional students can go to Hudson's office to talk when stress gets them down is a relief.
"She always tells us, 'I have plenty of Kleenex and chocolate if you need to talk,'" Mothersbaugh said.
Established in 2006, the New Start program already boasts 450 non-traditional students, Hudson said.
One of these 450 is Mothersbaugh, who transferred to Winthrop from York Technical College in 2005.
She has been working for the New Start program as an ambassador since 2007 and said it's been a great experience.
Mothersbaugh said she learned about being an ambassador while taking a mass communication class in which she had to interview Hudson.
"I was really impressed with the way she cared and nurtured non-traditional students," she said. "A few semesters later, I e-mailed her to see how things were going for her. It was amazing to see she still had that same compassion and love for her job."
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