Academic Guidance offerings during the Covid-19 pandemic

This paper describes the profound changes made to the Department of Human Sciences’ academic guidance program as a result of the COVID-19 public health emergency. Given that the program is an integral part of Milano-Bicocca University’s overall education plan, the pandemic triggered the need to radically modify the format and contents of its various components. A range of methods were adopted to reach out to secondary school students and provide them with essential information and opportunities to familiarize themselves with university life, thereby enabling them to make informed choices. The first step undertaken by the Department’s Academic Guidance team was to adapt the existing calendar of activities and convert all the in-person events scheduled from May onwards into livestreamed events that were also recorded and remained available for viewing on the university website. As well as this shift to a distance mode of delivery, the Department’s entire guidance program was revisited: additional encounters were designed for high school students; these offered thematic presentations of disciplinary content and university teaching methods as well as practical information. While the online sessions were shorter than the on-campus events they were replacing, they were designed ad hoc to maximise dialogue and interaction between presenters and audience. Especial care was taken to ensure that the program was effective from a communications point of view, particularly by offering multimedia information content that was clear and user-friendly. This paper illustrates how guidance may be interpreted as an opportunity for learning and personal/professional growth, underpinned by the adoption of a reflexive stance that will help students to make more mindful choices when defining their educational and career identities.