Study Abroad Pre-Departure Orientation:
Subcommittee members from Emmanuel College, MassArt, Simmons College and the GEO Center, dive into the next phase of pre-departure orientation revamp with updating and improving the Handbook for travelers abroad as well as the online learning modules that all students are required to review prior to travel. Volunteers from the COF GEO Center, Study Abroad Council, and returned study abroad students administered two in-person orientations to 89 COF students going abroad this summer, fall, and academic year. Attendees were pleased by the health, safety, and cultural information they received, especially by hearing the hands on experience from the returnees.
Nonresident Alien Taxes:
This year marks that 10th year that the campuses have collaborated on supporting international students and scholars via the joint purchasing of tax software that specifically helps international students and scholars complete the 1040-NR (nonresident) and other federal tax forms. This will also be the third year that the COF offers tax software that also helps international students and scholars prepare their State of Massachusetts tax forms as well. With input from the International Student and Scholars Advisors Committee, we moved to a fully self-service model of accessing the tax resources. For this past tax season, nearly 200 students from across the COF enjoyed enhanced tutorials of which they were able to review and access 24-hours a day, 7 days a week. The GEO Center continued to be available via phone, email, and appointment to assist students with any technical issues that they encountered along the way.
F-1 Data Management:
On February 9, the International Student and Scholars Advisors Committee (ISSAC) reviewed a demo of the F-1 data management prototype in TerraDotta software. International student advisors and a few students from each campus will participate in a usability test of the newly developed online process, to take place in spring semester. Feedback from this testing will help the GEO Center to tweak the current prototype and roll out the final version for the fall 2018 semester check-in. When the J-1 process was moved online, it reduced processing times from roughly 2 weeks, to 2-3 business days. We expect that the F-1 online process will have a similar result.