When Does the Craziness Start? Oh, tomorrow!

I've had a relatively calm week and a half. That's all about to change tomorrow. For some reason, October and February are the two months when institutions of higher education want to cram every single event. September is still to early, and November get you into holiday breaks. So, all the retreats, forums, and banquets have to happen within the month of October.

Since the beginning of classes, I've been recruiting students for two specific programs: a retreat where we learn about vocation (most of my programs are involved with vocation) and an alumni mentoring program (what do they mentor on? Why, vocation, of course!) Again these two activities occur (or at least start) within the same week.

These are actually two of my favorite programs. It's just complicated recruiting students for these programs. I'm competing with EVERY other event (that has to occur during October). Sometimes, I think our colleges and universities put forward too many activities. Or maybe it's not that they offer too many activities. We just all try to recruit the same students. I'm sure there are students at my college that feel like there is NOTHING going on. When I'm up to my neck recruiting for these programs, I want to thunk these students over the head.

Anyway, I'm excited for both my programs. I filled my registration quotas for both! The Alumni Mentoring has its first dinner of the year tomorrow night. I tried to get the teams to all match up perfectly. Tomorrow is when I find out how well I did. I have to make this program go well. It was not included in the Lilly Grant extension, so I want to move it over to the Alumni Relations Office. There is a new director of Alumni Relations. If I can get her to see the value in this program, then she will be more open to throwing some money to it.

The vocation retreat is Friday and Saturday. Usually, we are an overstaffed retreat. We only take 12 students, and we have had 4-5 staff going. This time, due to other circumstances, we only have two staff. I think this is going to be much more appropriate. Of course, it means that I have to pick up some responsibility from someone else. But I'm excited to go. I've started looking forward to this retreat. It's a nice chance to get away.

So, tomorrow, I'll be going nuts. I'll be buying last-mniute supplies and printing a lot of forms. I'm sure once we are up and running, the stress will diminish. I just need to make sure that I get to that point.