The program is designed using two phases, the second is the one that occurs right before move-in. The first takes place a month earlier over three days where students will have remote advising with an Orientation Leader by means of telephone, Skype, Google+, or other means in order to register for classes. An issue arises when you realize that students must first know what to do to prepare to register for classes (learn about degree requirements, test score restrictions, writing requirements, general education, appropriate number of hours, etc.). To meet this need it was decided that the orientation office would film a video and post it online to YouTube. The video ended up being 1.5 hours long, which is too long for YouTube which has a max upload length of 10 minutes for most videos. Secondly, most international Students come to UC Davis from China, a country that, unknown to the Orientation Coordinators at the time, has banned the use of YouTube.
There lies the rub. How do you create an interactive, educational tool to be used by students thousands of miles away under these circumstances? My supervisors decided to email out a PDF of the slide show, with the script so that students could visually follow through the steps needed to prepare for registration. This is a duct tape fix to an issue that is to be improved for the future.
In all honestly, I did not realize that China banned YouTube until having this enlightening conversation with my supervisors. Makes our work as a global citizen have to grow to meet the needs of students in countries that have barriers to our expected levels of social connection. This is a good wake-up call on the issue of access. We of course still want this program to be a success, and now must work to ensure that success through our adaption to meet needs.
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