By Abigail Lauten-Scrivner, UM News Service

MISSOULA – It’s a busy time for new University of Montana students arriving on campus this week as they begin making friends, decorating residence halls and learning the lay of the land they now call home. But incoming students’ first week also plays a pivotal role in helping set the tone of their entire academic and personal journey at UM. 

Now in its fifth year, the Big Sky Experience – UM’s innovative “welcome” to new Grizzlies – goes beyond the basics of a traditional orientation. 

“The Big Sky Experience was really designed as a retention program – the purpose of which is to engage students with one another and with this place,” said Devin Carpenter, UM director of New Student Success. “Ultimately, this all boils down to feeling like they belong and that they matter on campus.”

According to the 2022 Connected Student Report, students who have a great onboarding are 35 times more likely to have a great overall college experience, and there’s a 73% correlation between onboarding experience and perception of the overall college experience. Since the inception of the Big Sky Experience in 2019, its positive impact has consistently been reflected in rising retention rates. 

“Our retention has gone up every single year since we started this program,” Carpenter said. “That speaks for itself.”

Following the Big Sky Experience’s rollout, students were retained from fall 2019 to 2020 at 75.1% – a nearly 7% increase from 2018 – and it’s a metric that’s risen steadily since. UM also broke an all-time record from fall 2022 to 2023 with a 76% retention rate for first-time students. 

Finding a place and purpose on campus and in the broader community is key to students' personal happiness and academic success, Carpenter said. The Big Sky Experience shows them the possibilities for connection before classes start. 

Students first take part in an interactive online orientation over summer that provides essential logistic information customized to the needs of traditional, transfer, veteran or adult learners. Students then focus on peer engagement once they arrive on campus.

New students spend the Big Sky Experience in small groups led by UM Advocates – students who serve as mentors and ambassadors to campus and take on a leadership role during orientation, helping with move-in, showing incoming students around and leading their small groups in workshops and activities. 

“The Advocates can be a mentor to students for their whole first year, it doesn’t have to end after that week,” Carpenter said. “We could not do this program without them.”

The Advocates lead their group through a series of dynamic programming that facilitates opportunities to connect with peers, returning UM students, campus and the broader Missoula community.

Students are broken into their small groups based on the Big Sky Experience activity they sign up for. Considered the most unique part of the week, students choose which campus or community partner to join for a unique two-day experience. Options include Aerie Backcountry Medicine, Grizzly Athletics, Free Cycles, Campus Dining, Lake Missoula Tea Company and many more. 

Students typically are able to select an organization that aligns with their interests, creating an opportunity to connect with working professionals early in their college career.  

“These students are potential employees, volunteers and interns,” Carpenter said. “I’ve started hearing anecdotes of students who are already going back to the organization they worked with.”

Destination Missoula will host a Big Sky Experience group for the third time this year. 

“I love working with the students and being able to engage them,” said Emily Rolston, group sales manager for Destination Missoula. “I do think that it really benefits the students to make these connections.”

After learning about the organization’s mission of promoting sustainable year-round tourism, students participate in a marketing activity. They’re randomly given a target audience, time of year and one marketing method to create an itinerary and marketing campaign. Students have created posters, videos and other creative projects in the past that impressed Destination Missoula staff and sparked their own ideas. 

“It’s fun for us, too,” Rolston said. “We’re learning from these students as well.”

UM Advocate Co-Coordinators Lauren Schulte and Delanie Schultz, both juniors, cited their community site activities as a highlight of the Big Sky Experience. 

Schulte, a psychology major and climate studies minor from Spokane, Washington, was with Soft Landing Missoula, a community-based nonprofit that works with refugee and immigrant families.

“We got to meet refugees who are living in Missoula from all over the world, which was really a very special experience,” she said. “It was very enriching and something I probably wouldn't have had contact with if it wasn’t for the Big Sky Experience, and on top of that my BSE leader became one of my best friends.”

Other highlights of the week include opportunities to ask the Advocates any and all questions about life at UM, as well as fun activities like the River Rendezvous and Freshman Float, karaoke and flag tag. 

“I went (to karaoke night) by myself, but I ended up leaving with one of my best friends,” said Schultz, a business management and communications major from Kalispell. “That week definitely helps you realize that as a new student you’re not by yourself at the University.”

After enjoying their Big Sky Experience as freshmen, Schulte and Schultz decided to become campus leaders themselves and train as UM Advocates – a lengthy process that involves enrolling in a for-credit class taught by Carpenter where Advocates learn to become an encyclopedia for UM. They each led Big Sky Experience groups as sophomores. This summer, they collectively spent 60 hours each week coordinating this year’s orientation and are excited to see it all come together. 

Each looks forward to greeting students and their families on campus move-in day. 

“The impressions students and families get from the Advocates – and the BSE and campus as a whole –are really important to us,” Schulte said. “Our hope is just to make their stressful, busy days a little bit better.”

“We get the opportunity to wash their worries away,” Schultz added. “We get to tell them that it's going to be OK.”

The duo agreed that the best parts of orientation are helping new students gain confidence on campus as the week progresses. While they hope every student ends the Big Sky Experience feeling safe and happy at UM, they acknowledge not everyone will make their best friends within the first week.  

“It’s OK if you don’t meet all of your best friends in the first week,” Schulte said.

“It's something that takes time, and it’s OK if it does,” Schultz echoed. 

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Contact: Devin Carpenter, UM director of New Student Success, 406-243-2332, devin.carpenter@mso.umt.edu.