 Good morning everyone or good evening depending on where you are right now. My name is Laura Shram and I'm the director of professional development at Rackham Graduate School. We have two amazing student panelists who'll be joining us today. One of them we are having a little trouble with their audio and video they they had to log out and hopefully they'll be logging back in. Because we only have an hour together and we have a little bit of a presentation at the start we are going to get started. So the goals of today's session are for us to just share a couple insights from the scholarship about graduate education on common challenges that folks face in transitioning to a graduate program. And we also are going to hear from a couple of experienced international students about how they successfully navigate at their transitions. And I'll be putting out some questions to them but we also hope that you all who are here will feel comfortable asking questions of our panelists to so if you have questions about transitioning this is the place to be. So Julie Passelt is a leading scholar in graduate education and I'll be using her conceptual model of graduate education to frame our discussion today. She has a model of the common challenges that graduate students face in their time in grad school. So today I'm going to walk through the common academic challenges that people face transitioning to graduate school. I'll go over sociocultural challenges which result from conflicts between our social and cultural backgrounds and the social and cultural context that we're in in our graduate studies. And lastly, I'll discuss to psychosocial challenges and psychosocial challenges are about the interrelation between social factors on the one hand and our individual thoughts and behaviors. And I want to note that these are complex challenges and there may be combinations of academic and sociocultural and psychosocial domains but for simplicity's sake I'm going to talk about these three categories separately. So first is academic challenges students often report that the academic challenge in graduate school is unlike anything they faced in their previous studies and this can be very stressful for students who've gotten here because they have always been high academic achievers. The academic challenges really are rooted in subject matter learning students have to develop and demonstrate the ability to engage in original field specific research. And often it's the first time that we're not just learning about our fields but being asked to create an original contribution to the field. And students are expected to master their field or for doctoral students even advance the field once they've achieved mastery. So it's really stretching our capacities as students and scholars, academically speaking. So there have been many studies of graduate students at a single point in time and Dr. Purcell's framework is grounded in those past studies. No scholar or group had previously conducted until very recently a multi-year study to track across time how students experienced their graduate programs and RACM implemented such a study four years ago now the Michigan Doctoral Experience Survey or MDES is what it's referred to. So we are in the fourth year of the study we're past the midpoint and it'll span five years when it's complete and the data from the study really illustrate what scholars already suspected about the challenges of transitioning to graduate school. So this is a finding from the study that relates to academic challenges. Our RACM research on doctoral students finds evidence of decreased sense of self-efficacy due to the transition to graduate school. So what is self-efficacy? Self-efficacy measures students' confidence in their ability to learn and become independent scholars in their discipline. So we find evidence that the subject matter learning challenges negatively impact students' sense of self-confidence in their ability to be independent scholars. And this reflects what Dr. Purcell argues that the academic challenges are significant and very normal in your first year of graduate school and you may feel initially like you're less confident than you thought you were coming into graduate school as you tackle these new academic challenges. So next I'm going to go over sociocultural challenges which result from conflict between our internal states and the social and cultural context we're in in graduate studies. So there are often conflicting norms of challenge and support and let me explain what that means. US higher education is what scholars refer to as an apprenticeship model where faculty provide and then withdraw support to their students to help build their independence. So you may come from a place where faculty give tons of constant support to you as a scholar in the past. In graduate studies in the US, faculty yes give support but often withdraw that support in order to help students build their independence which can be very challenging for new students in particular. There's often also conflicting academic and personal values so some academic values in US higher education are sort of published or perish. In other words, you must publish your scholarship, what's called placing students in research focus tenure track jobs so really the desire by faculty to see their students get jobs in places like where they are teaching. So these are some of the values that you might confront in your home programs and among faculty, whereas personal values might be providing foreign spending time with one's family, giving back to one's community of work life balance and so on. I'm going to add that values dissonance is even more pronounced for those from different nations and cultures where our national or familial cultures might have very different values than the dominant values in academia in the United States. So lastly, there are several psychosocial challenges and that means factors that are at the intersection of our individual mindsets and our social context. So the first one of these is a term called imposterism. So imposterism is a phenomenon where you believe in yourself as an intellectual fraud, and it often involves someone finding it very difficult to internalize their achievements. Any students feel like they're a fraud that they don't belong. They're the stupidest one in their incoming class. They don't know how they got into their programs. This is very common feeling in the transition to graduate school. And second are identity threats. So what are identity threats. This just means students from historically marginalized groups can have the additional burden of bias incidents, microaggressions or lack of role models who share their social identities. I want to note that international students, depending on your departmental context, whether there are lots of other international students or international faculty in your program may also face these identity threats. So I just want to note that these challenges too are interconnected. So the research shows that those from historically marginalized groups tend to also report higher frequency of imposterism. So when we don't feel like we belong or when we're constantly feeling threatened in our program, it's more common for us to experience a sense of being a fraud and not belonging and not being good enough. So there are many challenges from academic to sociocultural that can impact our mental and physical health. So Rackham's research on doctoral students finds evidence of diminish mental and physical health due to the transition to graduate school. So on your screen on the left, you can see students self reported mental health, both male and female students, the males are the blue line, the females are the green line, and physical health kind of mirrors as well a dip between the first and second year. These effects are consistent across departments and fields of studies so it isn't the case that you know engineering students are reporting a harder time than social science students. It's really across the board students are reporting lower mental and physical health as they transition to graduate school. In addition to overall mental and physical health the study looked at stress, students self reports of levels of stress, and again from years one to three students do reports somewhat more experiences with stress so higher levels of stress in the transition to graduate school. So I want to share a couple of resources before we open it up to our amazing panelists. The first time I ever sought the help of a psychological counselor was during my graduate studies and I was having a very hard time. Just managing the academic workload and experiencing significant levels of stress more than I ever had previously and this is normal is what the research shows. And this is the reason why Rackham, engineering Ellis and a all have embedded counselors that you can reach out to. We have a link on the slides that will send out to everyone where you can learn about who might be a counselor you can reach out to as a resource if you're really experiencing a high level of stress. The university health services also has wellness coaching and these are folks who can help you with just, you know, a couple of sessions of talking about stress management techniques and how to take care of yourself during what is often a stressful transition. New this year is a Canvas course for all incoming graduate students called Grad School 101. You should all have access to this when you log into your Canvas dashboard. And you'll find links to resources on health and wellness, what Rackham can offer you budgeting and finance. There are also some mini courses including one and creating a good relationship with your advisor and how to navigate career development as a grad student. And you'll see more and more mini courses that are rolled out for you on that Canvas site throughout the year. So that's a great resource that you can kind of log into and find resources anytime in a range of areas. And lastly, one of the strategies shown to combat imposterism is to connect with a peer group where you feel safe sharing about your common stressors. And this is especially true for those who move from a different country or even a different region of the country where you might be cut off for the very first time from your social and family support networks. Our Rackham sponsored student organizations are graduate Rackham International who co-sponsored this workshop with Rackham. Also the Rackham student government and students of color of Rackham. There are lots of other great organizations at the program and school or college level. So I would urge you to seek out what other organizations might be a good social support network for you. So I'm going to now open it up to our panelists. It looks like is Mohammed here, Kristen and Viva. Oh yeah, here he is. I know it sounds like he's had some challenges in terms of just getting connected but Mohammed Abdullah is a mechanical engineering graduate student he'll be one of our panelists and Viva is in engineering education research and the two of them. I'll put out a couple of questions to them but then I encourage folks to put questions in the chat if you have questions for our panelists. I thought it would be interesting to hear Viva and Mohammed, just from each of you to tell us a story about your biggest challenge in your first year and how you faced it. Viva, do you want to get us started and then I'll pass it over to Mohammed. Sure, thanks for the introductions Laura. I, so I, I don't know if this is like the biggest challenge but it was really, it was, it was interesting to navigate. So I did my bachelor's here in North Carolina and then I transitioned to a program, a master's program at the University of Michigan. And I, and I didn't realize like there's a procedure to change from one university to another when you're on an I 20. Every university has its own procedures. And so that's like something that I have to familiarize myself with so if anyone is like you know considering transitioning from undergrad to grad or like a master's to PhD I would just you know in advance look at what your graduate school the procedure is that it's not really difficult it's just like you know you need to know that it exists and that you need to follow it. So that was something that was like a little I was thrown off by it. Yeah, and we didn't even talk about that as one of the common challenges but yeah just navigating the policies procedures, particularly for international students who have additional burdens of worrying about your visa and employment regulations, I think those policies and procedures can be a significant source of transition stress. Yeah, what about you Mohammed. Hello, good morning everyone. I mean audible. Okay, great, perfect. I'm Mohammed Abdullah as Lauren to do is thanks for having me over here. I'm in PhD mechanical engineering, but also now I'm part of like environmental and sciences, and just talking about the biggest challenge. I'm also an international student, hailing from Pakistan. And I came over here in 2017 from a master's program in mechanical engineering and the biggest, or I would say like the first, the foremost challenge was just like getting along in the community like the kind of personality that I am like and particularly coming from like completely different country different educational system and an entirely different community, different language culture and a lot of. It's kind of a lot for me to take in process and then get along with the all of the community. So, yeah, it was just getting along with the community finding and connecting with new people and developing and making like meaningful connections just beyond the academic not just with your class fellows for projects and assignment but like real life, long or like meaningful connections with other people. That was the challenge, I face I would say. Yeah, and that really drives home the socio cultural challenges that are, you know, double triple for international students like, you know, all students face these challenges, and yet it's much more significant when you're leaving all your social and family efforts and just like you said trying to find community both in your program but also in the wider community in terms of your personal life, whether that might be a spiritual community or your interests and hobbies all of those things are really important. Yeah, Viva, were you going to add something on that. Yeah, I was going to add. It's actually very important for you just for your you know academic career or post academic career to really form meaningful connections in general. And I feel like it can be disheartening when in the beginning you know you don't feel like you're making as many friends or you don't know as many people but I feel like over time you'll realize that like like minded people, you'll come together with them, especially like, you know, joining different student orgs on campus was really helpful to me because that's where you can see people with similar values. Outside of classes so I would like recommend looking at what's out there based on your interest. Yeah, that's super helpful for each of you and maybe I'll have Mohammed answer first this time what do you wish you had known in your first year. Yep, that's I'm pretty confident about is about the resources availability for all of the students and particularly for the graduate students. I don't think there is any segregation between undergrad and grad student but in general resources available for the students and particularly for your mental health. And also including the physical resources like recreation building or like other resources from the caps, like one thing in particular I can mention is, there's like a room in the pure pond Commons where you can just simply go and relax yourself. You will light folks over there like particularly for the winters that as it can get a bit depressing over here and the winter is coming. And there are some massage chairs as well. So the caps is really an amazing resource over here I would say so do look into that Laura has already shared go through all of us resources and just go and use it. What about you, Viva. Okay, I love that you brought up caps because I, there's also this thing called Wolverine wellness, which I was like going through like a pretty bad breakup in the first semester which is like, you know, tough to navigate with everything else and you can have an appointment and go talk to someone and it's completely free. It's also like a lot of people might you know have stigma against like seeking out health for mental health but it's really like just like talking to talking to like a impartial person and it can be very helpful, especially when you are really overwhelmed with school and research and like other life stressors. It's a really great resource. And something else that I really found useful was, you can rent equipment from the recreational center so if even if like you know you don't, you don't have your own like hiking stuff or bikes or you know whatever outdoor outdoor equipment you might need. You can rent them and you can go out there. Michigan has like really great outdoor spaces. Those are like great to explore. See, this is amazing because I have been on this campus since 2003 when I started as a grad student and I didn't even know you could rent things from RecSports so I'm learning. I think it's a branch of, yeah it's a branch of RecSports so just look up like rentals you miss outdoor or something. I just found it as you were talking. I was like I didn't even know about this so I just put a link in the chat. Yes, that's amazing. What advice would you each give to incoming students? We have lots of them here today. If you could share a piece of wisdom, what would you say? Do you want to start, Viba? I would say don't be afraid to ask for help. Especially like if you have, if you're a part of a lab group, I usually found that some of the senior lab members are very helpful in understanding like the norms of your lab culture, the expectations that your professor usually had, that your advisor has for you, and just like suggestions on what classes to take so especially with the classes I think it's really helpful to ask around because you really get to know how much work a class is and like, you know, if the professor teaching it is doing a good job or if it's actually helpful for you to take those classes so definitely ask around about classes and just be like open to meeting people and don't be like afraid to like look stupid because there's like no stupid questions. There's just so much you don't know. So just anything, you have a doubt just ask someone like texted me yesterday and they were like, oh, what is the norm in American culture about gifts? And so like she was a new international student and I was like, that's a very valid question because like I struggled with it when I first got here because I was like, it's different from where I come from. So, you know, any question that you can have just like text a friend, they're not going to, you know, say no. I think you just said something that I want to reinforce and that's, you know, we have our faculty mentors and the graduate coordinators in our program who are all amazing resources but really do lean on your senior colleagues whether that's in your program, or folks that you can do through grin or other student organizations because it's often those peer mentors who can really supplement where you feel safe asking questions like that that might feel like, well how can I ask my faculty advisor about like gift giving culture in the United States like that's a great thing to be able to ask a peer mentor and if your program has a formal peer mentor program which many departments do I would encourage you to sign up for that. It has a peer mentor program to if I see Mohammed and Viva nodding so if you feel like just given the challenges of finding new community that you haven't been able to find a friend who you can ask these questions to, I'd encourage you to sign up for a peer mentor through grin or other means available to you because those folks can be such a great resource just in helping getting your questions answered. Mohammed what about you, what advice would you give that was great advice. I will just like keep on adding on to that like just because it was also like the struggle that I had, and also like, yeah kind of like hard step to go through. They would just say like, take your time process and just observe and understand, and just talk, speak. It would really help you go through the states transitioning states or challenges, if any, I mean, not necessarily you would have challenge, but if you are having it's more than normal, even not like, in all international students with some like even domestic students with that. So don't worry about that and just like try to connect new people try to utilize their resources. When you talk to one person you could just get to know about two other resources and when you go to one of those two resources you just get to know like two or more. It's kind of like trickle down tree effect, which you would see the benefit of if you just like start taking one step, no matter how small or how big the step is just initiate the step. And yeah I was going to mention the mentorship program that Laura had already mentioned. So, you can become international green has already established and we have been doing this for the past couple of years. So you can like, being an international student connect to other international students who have already been over here in this community. So that might help you understand what their process was. Maybe they would have the head gone through the same state that you are going same challenges. That can be really, really helpful. And again, this is not the only option your department might also have like some mentorship program like in our mechanical department they also do this mentoring program. So you not only have the outside of academic mentorship program but also you could have already have some academic related mentorship program as well. And as I was mentioning that, feel free to connect with your lab seniors. If you're working in any lab, if you're not even working in any lab, just find some random senior or like just find some random person and then ask them. If not just go to the coordinator or the like the staff in your department, they are really helpful they're super helpful they have been over here helping the students. So they are experienced in helping you so they would know a lot more. And please you will know like at least one more thing about the resources available today. Yeah, I know when I was a new graduate student and I'm just putting this in the chat. Something Mohammed pointed out is there are also staff in your departments that are their job is to help you navigate the resources and find the support that you need. Typically their title is something like graduate coordinator. You've likely encountered this person already whether it's emailing about your admissions or, you know, logistical things related to orientation but they are supposed to be doing a lot more than just pointing you to orientation. So that's someone if you again don't have a peer mentor yet and you're feeling really socially isolated. Just like Mohammed said taking one step and talking to one person that might be a great person to start with, since they are, they're not grading your work they're not evaluating you they really are the person in your department or program that's identified to help support graduate students, you know, in finding resources and getting connected to research and things like that so with that I want to make sure we have plenty of time for questions from our attendees. You can feel free to use the chat to ask questions of Viba and Mohammed. So either put your questions in the chat or folks if you're comfortable you can mute and just share out your question verbally so either way. How do students get up here mentor with grand yeah do do either of you want to share a little bit more about how to get connected to that program. Yeah, I mean, we already like our and have been sending emails to the new students about various opportunities and events and like, etc that we organize. So if you have not already received that email we can like, I'll just copy and paste the form over here. Yeah, Laura has already shared the website so you can easily go over there. Reach out to any person you can also email me I can leave over here and then I can personally share the program details with you. It's just like simple form, asking about your program and background information and that should be it, and we'll be able to like peer with you with some already mentor program. So yeah just reach out to the green at you missed out edu and just shoot out a simple email that hey please send us information, and I can also like meanwhile, we're talking I can also like pull out the form link and send it over here. Yeah, that would be great. Any other questions. I always say the zoom silence is more silent than regular silence. Oh yes look we have a grad coordinator here so seeing Nicole is making sure that she knows how to support you all in her program. Hello. Yes. Yeah, I have a. I cannot just tell my, you know, challenges and share with you guys and see that. Yeah. Maybe I can get some help. Yeah, go ahead and share. Yeah. Firstly, I'm a student, a first year master's student in the statistics, and I'm an international student from China and I don't have any experience in, you know, to study a board. So I think the most challenging part firstly is to understand what the teacher is saying in the lecture, you know, to have the experience to listen to a maybe two hours lecture, and the whole time the teacher is just to give going our give our information on some knowledge. So it is firstly the challenging part and secondly I think that I have struggling with my homework, but it's not that hard but but it's very challenging to know what the teacher, or the instructors really want you to do in your assignment. Yeah, so I don't know their. I don't know their expectations for us, and how we were going to finish our assignments. And above that academic parts, I think there is also changing although our department has a lot of, you know, students in my from my country, but it's started to be competitive among, you know, apply for PhD or get a new job or something that we will face in the future. So it's very, it is a little bit tension here, and everybody just want to, you know, get their road clearly behind of them. So I think, and make me a little bit stressful at this time. But I'm lucky that this to students. They share about how to, you know, about warring wellness and that caps thing, I think, maybe I will try them and you know just find my inner peace. Yeah, that sounds very stressful I just want to name it sounds like yeah you're navigating, like just that exhaustion of like being in an English language context full time for the first time like not having done this study abroad. And, you know, maybe feeling like it's highly competitive with your peers where it feels less comfortable connecting to peers in your home program, and on top of all of that not being sure what that expectations are around assignments. Viva or Muhammad do you have anything you want to say I have a thought on a resource but I think you two are experts even more than me so I'll let you share first. Anything. Oh yeah. Yeah. So hi everybody my name is Andres. I'm also a first year PhD student in biological chemistry. I, I have the same feeling that the girl who was talking before the main. So I was a little bit insecure about my listening ability during my classes. But something that I haven't using is the this resource that I put in the chat with basically when the professor is talking, it's going to do the transcript for the class so after class you can check that that is something that I haven't using during these two weeks, because it's kind of insecure about my listening so when the professor is talking. It is doing the transcripts and you're going to have access to the audio and also a transcript there. So you need to use your computer and actually using your email address from the university. You need access to almost six hours of recording so you can use that to get transcript and then you can study after class that's something that I haven't using because I have the same feeling. Yeah, that's great. So maybe yes specifically on just linguistic adjustment do either of you have thoughts related to that Viva or Muhammad. Thank you so much for this resource even like I did not know that so thanks for that. But the thing that I found helpful is reaching out to professor or the instructor, whoever you're in the class with this telling them know what the issues are that you have been facing or simply don't understand or follow the material. More likely than not they would definitely do something make some arrangements to help you. They can probably provide you the detailed description of what they are going to speak what they're going to talk maybe also share with you their slides with the notes in it if there anything. There's only one resource that I could think of like this reaching out to them and then letting them know that, hey, I've been sitting over here in class for the past two weeks, but I haven't been falling much of it I simply do not understand so maybe if you could try to speak slowly if they have been speaking fast or like this different thing or anything that they could accommodate you with they can most likely they would do that. I was also going to suggest reaching out to the professor, because they're usually very responsive to like they want to know like if someone is having any kind of trouble or struggle in their class they want to know so that they can help. I mean, sometimes, some professors like don't care as much which is always, you know, it's not a good feeling when you come across that. But I noticed that like sometimes taking a fewer number of classes can also be helpful as you're transitioning, especially because you have to like, you know, adjust to a new culture and kind of deal with like the mental load of that. I think eight is the minimum amount of credits that you need to be enrolled isn't it like you need to be full time. So, if you can take like just the amount of credits, you need to be full time maybe like you know to find ways to reduce like your academic load sometimes can be helpful as you're like navigating the early stages I know I've always taken like with undergrad or any grad level I've the first semester I've always taken like very little just because I wanted to. involve myself more in like my lab or like other activities so I can like transition better. Yeah, I would add one last resource that you may already know about but the English Language Institute is a resource for all students even though some folks often see like oh it says lsn a and I'm in bio stats like I do I have access to that and you do have access to it and they have lots of different programs from like workshops to conversation circles so the conversation circles is one that again is just having informal conversations with someone who's not in your program who really cares about international students and just helping them with their speaking and listening. And it's kind of a safe space to do a little bit more of that language immersion so I put a link to their website in the chat to so you could, you know, reach out and see what they even have academic advisors there like elie academic advising kind of has a link on the main page you could ask to meet with one of their advisors and just say you know my time is extremely limited. I'm a master's student what are what like one or two things might be helpful for me related to just getting acclimated to listening for hours to like advanced. And because it's in your academic discipline to so there might be you know highly advanced specialized jargon and terminology that some of the domestic students also aren't familiar with so I would just name that like academic jargon is very different from conversational English and that is normal and normal academic challenge to adjust to. And I, I do think one thing I wanted to emphasize that both be gone Mohammed said is being able to talk to the faculty members so what I heard about the expectations for assignments being unclear. I think that when the office hours are for the course where you're feeling unclear about the expectations and you can go to that faculty members office. During those hours sometimes students think, I go if I go to office hours that's a sign that I don't know what's going on and I'm, I'm not smart that's not what it is at all. Because many students need clarification and need to ask questions of the faculty member and that's why all faculty set aside a period of time where you can come in and ask those questions one on one outside of class so I would encourage you to take a look at the percentage of those office hours that is very normal in United States higher education and often folks who maybe their faculty in their home country didn't do office hours or even you know folks in the US who are coming from public schools where teachers didn't do one on one appointments with students may not realize that that's normal and good to go to those office hours and say hey we have this problem set and I'm really unclear on how this is being evaluated and you know just bring that question and that safe space where you can do that during office hours. Yeah, these are great questions did that answer your question you done. Yes, okay. Other questions that folks might have. Oh interested in someone's interest in the recreational resource that you talked about Viba do you want to say more about that. Yeah, I'll drop the link for it after I finished talking. So I believe you can rent bikes or kayaks or like, I think it's like you have hourly rentals and I think you also have like every, you can rent them per day. I've been interested in renting bikes, just to like get around campus. Sorry, I got distracted by the chat. So, that's like one spot that I know on campus like recreation rentals but like, if you want to go kayaking you can also go to the Gallup Park, or as some of the parks in the city. And they have like paid rentals that are very I think accessible. And like if you want to explore like more of. Yeah, I think someone dropped the chat for the link for thank you, Mohammed. So, like even if you are interested in like the UP the upper peninsula of Michigan is very beautiful if you love outdoor being in nature. It's just like there's parts of Michigan that have really good like beaches or outdoor like hiking spots. So I would just, and Laura also dropped another link for it. So you can definitely like especially the a to gov page has all like listing of all like all the parks and recreational spots around campus. I think there's just so many, like from the hyper local this rec sports link to what's available in the Ann Arbor to what both of you by Mohammed put in the chat like Michigan as the state has a really amazing state parks system. So I can look up to the state parks information. I find like the state parks, if you don't have a vehicle that might be like a little more challenging to access but kind of connecting with friends who might have a vehicle or renting something for to do something on the weekend, just over this past weekend I was in with my husband celebrating our anniversary and I fell asleep on the beach, which was awesome. So when I was a new grad student, I didn't go to West Michigan until my fifth year of graduate school and I didn't even know that there were beaches in Michigan. So I wish someone had told me. Actually, yeah, Holland also has a to live festival, usually, I think in mid summer, which is really pretty if if that's something you know, people like to see. And also I would suggest like, there's a lot of winter activities to do in the winter months. And I think from the rentals that I mentioned you can also rent skis and snow shoes. So, another popular thing that I, I didn't know this was a thing it's like, you know that thing where you walk in snow with the, the skis, it's just walking. Like the snow shoeing is that what you're referring to be bought. Yeah, I can't remember the name of like the activity right now. Yeah, I think it's snow shoeing. I mean, that's really fun. I was like, Oh, we're just walking. But you know, I would definitely encourage people to like go out in the winter, especially with like, you know how how like seasonal depression can set in like it's really it's really helpful if you can keep yourself active and outdoors. Yeah, I noticed a follow up question in the chat about are there any sources for brand new international students to explore Ann Arbor, like the city local food attractions local community sharing similar backgrounds etc. I mentioned earlier the grad school 101 site and there is a page on there. I'm clicking back to make sure I find that the correct. But there's a link in that course that you all as new students should have access to it's called the Ann Arbor community and there's, you can just kind of click through and see all the resources there related to exploring the wider community. I don't know Viva or Mohammed if you have kind of just broadly good resources for people looking to explore Ann Arbor more just the city and getting to learn more about the community and what's available. So what I did when I came over here because I had like not so many friends well a few from communities are asking them was really helpful if they have been around over here for a while. And then I just went to like the city of Ann Arbor website, they have a lot of resources and good recommendations like I got to know about the parts over there about the packing activities and so many other things that I did not know that even like a few of the seniors did not know existed. So do check that out I would say and again maybe ask other people who have been around over here. And also like we will mention about the Tulip Festival so there's like Nichols Arbor item over here. They also have like pointing garden over there so it's kind of blooms and I guess in May or April somewhere that also like kind of good outdoorsy excursion activity if you're just feeling tired so and want to have a walk over there and see some beautiful places. So it's a free entrance for everybody. And regarding one thing I had been like holding up was that getting around in Ann Arbor, yeah definitely out of Ann Arbor you might need some car or something like that. But there's a greyhound that can take you probably a few of the places. And within Ann Arbor, make sure that you can use the ride the city buses they're completely free for you to just have to swipe and card. They can take you pretty much almost all of our the city of Ann Arbor they can take you to Gala Park, Argo Park, these are like two famous parks and outdoors activities in Ann Arbor. I would also recommend joining like your local departmental organizations so for example, I'm part of the grads we which is the Graduate Society of Women Engineers, which it's more the engineering for engineering graduate students. So we do like events like Apple Peking and like, you know, skating, ice skating and stuff like that so sometimes being part of those organizations you get like free access to like go do stuff and you know you get like sometimes they feed you and you know it's like a great place to meet people. So I would suggest checking out like, you know, organizations in your program, and like more like department specific. And I, I'm trying to look for a link which I have saved and it has like all the resources for winter supplies so I'm going to go I'm going to look for that if someone else wants to answer that the next question. Yeah, Mohammed well while Viva looks for that link someone was just concerned about like what do I for people who haven't lived in a really cold place like this what are some winter essentials. Yeah, so I attended this one. I'm attending this one class and I'm in sustainability and one of the class was just all about getting the resources around here. And somebody just mentioned, Oh, I went to a store to get the winter jacket and it was $1,000. I'm not going to get that. So yeah, don't feel like get overwhelmed about that. The key tricks over here that I have learned and generally everybody would recommend probably is just layering yourself up. So like in the, if you have already noticed that within the construction with links you might not feel that hot or that cold, only if you feel like go outside you would feel like this intense winters. So layering can help you prepare for that. Just wear like two one or two layers and if it's too cold outside, you can wear another if it is not that cold inside you can just easily take it off. In the stuff I would say like you don't really have to go to the super expensive stores. There are places around like, I found old Navy, there are like two different stores around here. I found like winter code for like, I guess 50 or 60 bucks so I didn't have to pay for like 1000 bucks over here. There are some other stores like TMX. You might not have a huge door ID over there, but you can definitely find good and cheaper stuff over there. They're like, they also have two branches or whichever is convenient and easy for you just take the ride or the city bus over there. Yeah, I mentioned old Navy, TMX, there is Briarwood Mall as well, but that might be a bit like could get possibly a bit expensive or not. So that's that. And yeah, there are other stores like Marshall's I guess around here that you can probably check. But yeah, buying multiple layers, layering yourself would kind of like help you instead of just spending an exuberant amount on just like one winter code, which you might only be needing for like I guess one or two months, like which are the peak winters. So layering would definitely help you go through the longest period of the winters over here from October to like all the way to April or May. Viva, do you have additional thoughts on that? Yeah, I'm so sad I couldn't find the Google Doc, so it's literally like a bunch of students that came together and put together a Google Doc of like the do's and don'ts. But I did find a good resource from the University Health Center that talks about winter survival tips. And I would say like people, you know, are will tell you it's terrible it's so cold. And while that's all true, you can you'll be fine. Like, you know, you'll be able to make it. So I wouldn't, you know, worry about like worry is stress about it. Like Mohammed said, like definitely layering helps a lot and I think it took me almost two years to learn that so definitely layer your life will change. And I think having a good pair of shoes is important is what I've noticed is more important than having a good jacket because there's like about a week or two where it'll be, it'll be snowing a lot. So you have to probably stretch through the snow or like icy sidewalks. So I would just be careful with when the sidewalks are icy because that's more that's worse than actual snow. So if you're not used to walking on ice, you might slip and that's not those can injuries can be nasty so just like walking slowly and having good heels to have a good traction is really important good shoes that have traction is really important. So Mohammed has just about just a couple minutes early. So as he's doing that I just wanted to thank him because this has been so great to hear from two experienced students so I know, speaking of walk time, need some walk time to get to his next appointment at 10am so thank you, Mohammed. And I know Viva has probably time for one other question if folks have another question for our panelists by Mohammed. Thank you so much. It was great meeting you. If people need I can leave my email address over here just to them to seek any help that I could probably help with that. So I'm just leaving my email over here feel free to reach out to me from green or personal or department or whatever I could help and I would be happy to do that. And thanks again for having me it was really great meeting you all. Bye. Any final question that we have this website from UHS is great. Actually, because yeah I don't know how many parents we have but there's some good comments in there to about how public school closures work if there's like weather. I know that it's very rare, but it does happen that the university might shut down due to inclement weather. I would say maybe that's happened once per year at most during my whole almost 20 years, my gosh, in Ann Arbor now so it's very rare but it does happen just so folks know that if it's incredibly icy or unsafe the university itself might also shut down. One thing I want to add is figure out your attack situation, because even as international students you might have like you know tax obligations, federal and at the state level so there's usually workshops that happen around this time and around tax the year which is like in March or April, I always forget the month. Yeah, they're doing April so usually folks prepare them in March and we did just have a workshop on this on September one, but we recorded it much like we're recording our session right now so that recording will be posted on the grad school page that again folks should have access to on your campus because yeah being in a new country and understanding tax obligations is can be very stressful and we know that and so we do offer twice a year, a workshop specifically related to taxes with someone who's a tax expert at the graduate school. So keep an eye out for either that workshop or the video of the workshop even if you couldn't attend. Yeah, so that's kind of a parting piece of wisdom any other parting wisdom be by I don't see any new questions in the chat. Um, I think yeah just like keep making sure that you know you are checking the International Central website periodically for any like related announcements. And I think they also have good resources with like for current students and like incoming students and like different even for a J1 students so I always reach out to the International Center if I have any question even if it's like the slightest like, even if it's like very you know small and feels like I'm bugging them but I just like ask the question so definitely feel free to reach out to them if you have any like questions with I 20 or your status and stuff. Yeah I'm so glad I can't believe International Center hasn't come up and probably all of you just getting here know that it exists but they do have really lovely kind of informational sessions and international coffee hours so again. If you're just feeling like you don't know who to ask something to the international coffee hours that I think they have weekly is yet another place where they'll just be an expert there a staff member who understands the challenges that international students and scholars face and can point you at least in the right direction and just be a safe space to drink coffee I suspect they're all virtual but drink your coffee or tea in your own space and oh it looks like no they're holding them outdoors I'm looking at the one that's next week so. That's another great resource for international students and they aren't just a resource for visa questions just like Viva said any question you can go to them and they'll at least point you in the right direction. So hopefully this session was helpful for everyone today. Glad so many of you were able to join us and I want to again we already think Mohammed but I want to thank Viva. She also helped us identify another panelists for the session and kind of co planned it with us so she really was a collaborator in the session yes I'll add a link to the grad school one oh one in the chat. If anyone is not able to access grad school one oh one. I please email me I'm going to put my email in the chat. And I'll pass it along to my colleague Paul are tall a who created grad school one oh one he got the data from our registrar's office for who should who should have access to the course so it may be due to a glitch in the registrar data that some of our incoming students didn't get access so email me if you log into your canvas and you don't see something that says grad school one oh one and I will get you access. Thank you everyone.