Welcome Week 2019 was STRESSFUL and SUCCESSFUL!

Welcome Week is a bit of a misnomer since it basically stretches from the beginning of freshmen moving in on August 13 to our last welcome event this past Sunday, September 1. UTD has it right: they're now calling it Weeks of Welcome!

FOCUS at UTD hosted 3 board game nights, 2 nights of zombie tag, 2 Field Day events (Ultimate Frisbee, Speedball, Bubble Soccer, 9-Square in the Air, Spike Ball, and more!), Take A Freshman to their Classes (campus tour), carpools to church on 3 Sunday mornings, a United Worship night with the other ministries on campus, Games on the Mall (with 4 square and frisbee and spike ball), our FNF and TNF kickoffs, and 2 ethnic specific outreach events. We also helped with 2 huge international student outreaches, the Garage Giveaway furniture drive and the Big Howdy, which had over 1000 international student in attendance. We got 350 interest cards at that event alone!

The 2 ethnic-specific outreach events were a new experiment this year, and they went great! On the first Tuesday of school, we hosted a Latin American social. Then, on Thursday, we hosted an Asian American social. We had over 70 students come to each! Our hope was to communicate to the campus that we are a diverse ministry with a desire to welcome all ethnicities into our community. We also wanted a chance to tell them that while we know being in a monoethnic group might be more comfortable, participating in a diverse group like FOCUS has the potential for greater growth all around.

Part of the circle at our Worship & Boba Tea Asian American social.

Part of the crowd at our LatinXplosion event playing a Mexican Bingo game.

Some sweet stories from our core leaders after the LatinX event.

Looking back, our weeks of welcome were a huge success, and both our large fellowship night and our cores are off to a great start! We took some time as a staff to go out on Lake Lavon and play for a morning--no work involved! It was really relaxing and rejuvenating. My good friend John Von Runnen was kind enough to take us all out on his boat.

The full-time UTD staff members and apprentices right after we got off the lake.

Student Testimony

And just in case you want to see a pic from our FNF Kickoff...

Thanks for all you do to make this mission a success! We couldn't do it without many prayers and generous donors!