Back to News 
By Madison Mathews
Johnson City Press
MILLIGAN COLLEGE — The transition from high school to college can sometimes be overwhelming, but faculty and staff at Milligan College have plenty of programs, classes and activities geared towards making the college experience as painless as possible for incoming freshmen.
After new students checked into their dorms, they were met with a week filled with activities designed to build relationships with each other as well as faculty and staff.
Following the annual Matriculation ceremony, where freshmen sign into the record books of Milligan College, new students were led to a dessert reception in the school’s Mary Sword Commons.
“It’s just a good opportunity for people to mingle with faculty and staff. The Student Government Association and other student leaders are there just to meet and greet the freshmen,” director of campusactivities Katy Mosby said.
Other activities for incoming freshmen include, a day at Doe River Gorge, a new student banquet, and an Elizabethton Twins baseball game and movie at the Stateline Drive In with returning students.
Mosby said these activities are designed to aid students in creating a community within Milligan and making things as “user-friendly” as possible. “That’s really what we shoot for with these activities. We have a large body of students that we’re trying to reach and give opportunities to reconnect, but really for the freshmen this is the time where they’re going to meet the friends that they’re going to have at least for their first year,” she said.
Milligan’s mission of educating men and women to be servant leaders starts when they arrive at the college during their freshmen year, director of the Institute for Servant Leadership and the Center for Calling and Career Beth Anderson said.
Through two courses during students’ freshman and sophomore years, Anderson said students begin to explore their talents and gifts, and how to use those gifts in God’s kingdom.
Introduction to College and Service is offered to freshmen and focuses on basic skills needed to succeed in college. During sophomore year, Introduction to Calling and Career explores how to use a student’s talents and gifts in a selected major.
Another large component in preparing students for not only the college experience but also the Milligan experience is the school’s mentor program. When freshmen arrive, they are divided into mentor groups led by a faculty member based on students’ academic major. The mentor program has been a part of Milligan for well over a decade.
Throughout a student’s freshman year, the mentor serves as academic advisor. Vice president for marketing and enrollment management Lee Fierbaugh said the group aspect of the mentor program gives students a chance to get to know other students with similar interests, as well as giving them someone they can rely on in the faculty mentor.
“It gives them an anchor here at the college, knowing that there’s one person they can immediately connect to based on their interest in an academic major and a person that is going to be there to support them in the transition into college.”