Resources for New Students
Photo credit: Yevhen Gulenko
This page is intended to introduce you to some of the most commonly accessed websites and tools you’ll need to succeed during your transition to Oberlin College and throughout your first-year.
We are incredibly excited to welcome you and help ensure success as you begin this journey!
Orientation for New Students
Getting Started
- Admitted Students Portal/Forms
- Your entry point to a variety of required items and resources.
- Technology for New Obies
- There are a few steps you’ll need to go through to get access to all things technological on campus, beginning with activating your ObieID.
Academic Resources
- Academic Advising Resource Center (AARC)
- The Academic Advising Resource Center (AARC)/Office of the Registrar supports academic advisors and students on issues related to academic success, progress toward degrees, courses, grading, and academic standing.
- Arts and Sciences Areas of Study
Explore Oberlin’s academic offerings. There are over forty academic majors, more than a dozen interdisciplinary minors and several integrative concentrations, curricular pathways incorporating experiential learning opportunities. - Conservatory Student Academic Affairs
- This office and the Student Academic Affairs (SAA) team helps with tasks related to many of the academic requirements and regulations for conservatory and double-degree students.
- Libraries
- The Oberlin College Libraries consists of the Mary Church Terrell Main Library, Terrell Special Collections, The Oberlin College Archives, The Clarence Ward Art Library, The Conservatory Library, and The Science Library.
Experiential Learning
Your first year is a time to explore your interests both inside and outside the classroom. The offices below support students in taking what they’re learning in the classroom and putting it into practice, helping them to make the most of their residential liberal arts experience!
- Community-Engaged Learning, Teaching, and Research
- Learn about opportunities to engage with community partners, from local schools to no-profit advocacy, in ethical ways that promote your awareness of local and global challenges and support your learning.
- Center for Engaged Liberal Arts
This hub for experiential learning will help you discover a wide array of options for extending your learning beyond the classroom. - Career Exploration and Development Center
- Oberlin College’s Career Exploration and Development Center will help you create the materials you need to start pursuing meaningful internships and other early professional experiences.
- Study Away
Learn how you can enrich your academic studies in destinations across the world and gain knowledge of global citizenry. - Undergraduate Research
- Undergraduate Research provides support for students conducting research with faculty members. Learn how you can start planning for research opportunities your first year.
- Winter Term
Your first Winter Term at Oberlin is a chance to try something new and explore the potential of immersive, project-based education.
Student Health and Wellbeing
- Office of Student Health and Wellbeing
- Our vision is to create and support a holistic student experience which facilitates student learning, success, and development by promoting a culture of health and wellbeing. We set out with the mission to establish a thriving environment where students are able to support their wellness through a culture of communal care, peer support, and individual responsibility.
Student Health and Wellbeing provides support and services to students through the following departments and programs:
Campus Resources
- Campus Dining
- Oberlin has a contract with AVI Foodsystems to operate the dining halls on campus. AVI is an on-site restaurant company that provides café and catering services to the college. It is especially committed to cooking with fresh seasonal ingredients in an environmentally sustainable fashion. AVI is committed to providing the best services to Oberlin students.
- Campus Safety
- Campus Safety remains open 24-hours a day to provide assistance and respond to immediate health and safety concerns from the faculty, staff, students, and visitors.
- The Center for Intercultural Engagement
- The CIE brings together International Student and Scholar Services, the Multicultural
Resource Commons, the Office for Disability and Access, and the Office of Religious and Spiritual Life as we strive to create a sense of inclusion and belonging by recognizing,
embracing, and celebrating the intersectionality of student identities at Oberlin. - Office of the Dean of Students
- The Office of the Dean of Students has as its mission to lead and inspire the Division of Student Life and to foster a sense of community in this residential college in which students build lasting relationships
- Residence Life
- “ResLife” maintains a personal presence in students’ lives through its staff of resident assistants (RAs) and village assistants (VAs), full-time students who help build community.
- Student Employment
- The Student Employment Office is committed to promoting student employment opportunities that can provide valuable work/education experience.
- Office of Student Leadership and Involvement
- The Office of Student Leadership and Involvement staff works to create a sense of
community within the college environment and to provide opportunities that support thedevelopment of the whole student outside the classroom.
Orientation & Fall Semester
- Orientation
- You can plan to begin your Oberlin transition during the summer as our Orientation Program will include a range of remote activities before the fall semester even starts.
- Peer Advising Leaders
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Once you arrive in Oberlin, you will meet your assigned PAL—Peer Advising Leader—from either the College of Arts and Sciences or Oberlin Conservatory. These PALs are trained to support you during your transition to college life—how to get around campus, offices to frequent for academic advising and personal assistance, best places to study alone or with a group, where to buy (or attain for free) essentials, how to manage your time, and much, much more. PALs also help first-year students use Oberlin’s academic and developmental advising system to its full potential.
Read more about PALs
Through our PAL Program, we want to:
- improve the quality of students experience, learning, retention, and success
- support students in learning to take advantage of the great range of educational opportunities and developmental support at Oberlin
- help students gain skills in interacting across our diverse student body within a supportive environment
Essentially, PALs want to show you how Oberlin works so that you can fulfill your academic goals and flourish both developmentally and socially while you’re here.
Meet this year’s PALs: