The “buddy system”, whereby international students are paired with local students to help them acclimate to the country and the institution has been proved to be an effective means of accomplishing social integration. An essential part of setting up an effective buddy system is recruitment, training of buddies and volunteer engagement. Without those elements, which reply heavily on student volunteers, the program can’t succeed. ESN has lots of experience in setting up buddy systems and conducted a training session on this topic.

The event took place virtually over Zoom and therefore we have made the recording available as part of our Toolkit.

Below are some of the resources referenced in the training

List of Needs (Buddies)

Social Games ESN