Are you a first-generation college student?
You might be and not even realize it! First generation can mean a lot of things. The University of Michigan defines it as a student whose parents did not complete a four-year bachelor’s degree. Students often think that they aren’t a first-gen if their parents completed some college or if someone else in their family, such as a sibling, an uncle, or even their grandparent completed college. If neither of your parents completed college, then you’re a first-gen!
Why first-gen status matters
Being a first-gen means that you might have a fairly different experience of college and student life, possibly finding it more challenging. This has nothing to do with your abilities and everything to do with background and the structure of college. How do we know this? Research shows that first-gens struggle in their first two years, as measured by course GPAs. If they don’t drop out, first-gens show no difference in course GPAs by their Junior year. If the difference were based on ability, then first-gen GPAs would never catch up. Rather, it has to do with first-gens learning, on their own, what they never had anyone to show them: how to be a college student and how to thrive in college. This is where SOUL comes in.
The SOUL Program
The SOUL Program takes a strengths-based leadership approach. We think that if you got to the University of Michigan without the same degree of preparation and background knowledge as most of your peers, then you clearly have skills like determination, intelligence, tenacity, forward-thinking, and adaptability. In short, you have the skills of a leader. The SOUL Program’s foremost aim is to help you to more fully develop your leadership potential. Furthermore, we focus not only on college life and success but success after college as well. When you graduate, you’ll be moving into new professional spaces as your career advances. In the same way that you adapted to college life, you’ll have to adapt to professional life as well. The SOUL Program trains you for a life of learning and adaptation, of constant personal and professional development, and a lifetime of success after you graduate.
Click here to see if you qualify and how to apply!
Contact
Dr. Matthew Sullivan,
SOUL Program Director
(msulli@umich.edu)
Jill Hoppenjans,
Sociology Academic Program Manager
(soc-acad.prog.mgr@umich.edu)