Suzanne and Stefanie, the new Student Services Team
This past June, the Department of Geography reorganized its undergraduate and graduate student services into one team-based service which will provide both undergraduate and graduate students with more comprehensive and effective service. With the departure of the previous undergraduate advisor in June 2014, the department combined its graduate and undergraduate student services under the leadership of former Graduate Program Manager, Suzanne Lawrence, who now holds the new title of Student Services Manager. Joining her team is our newest staff member, Stefanie Ickert, as Student Services Coordinator. This exciting new team-based initiative is a big step forward towards a more holistic Geography community at UBC.
The idea of having a combined undergraduate-graduate student services team is relatively new to UBC. Many departments have separate graduate and undergraduate advisors and many of them are faculty members rather than staff. Professor Marwan Hassan, Head of the Geography Department, believes this change will create a more effective, holistic, comprehensive, and timely service for students. Dr. Hassan elaborates, “From my first day as Head, I sought to empower staff, to utilize staff talent, for them to feel part of the decision making… This new Student Services team is just that. These two student-based services [graduate and undergraduate] naturally feed into one another. The previous system did not utilize the skills of the individual staff member. There was too much overlap in duties and responsibilities in the previous situation; it was based on need and necessity rather than long term visions or goals.”
This new student services team will have one person focused on major issues and long-term planning, and another staff member to do more day-to-day tasks. As a critical part of the interaction between the department and students, this new team will strengthen the Geography community as it strengthens the relationship between students and the department.
