Making the most of the Student Welcome Box in CU

UCCF’s Student Welcome Box is designed to help new students settle into uni life and make friends.

These packs are a great way for Christian freshers to grow spiritually and in their own personal evangelism by providing credible resources such as books, food and conversations starters. The aim is to help freshers feel more confident in introducing their new friends to Jesus.

But what’s in it, and how can you help your CUs make the most of it?

Know the pack

First things first – get to know what’s inside the pack. At first, it might seem like a random assortment of things, but each item serves a purpose. Here’s a helpful way to categorise the contents.

1. To discuss

Tea towel: This isn’t just to dry your dishes, it’s also got a series of helpful conversation starter questions on it. Leave it lying around for people to use and ask people one of those questions when they use it.

6 Weeks 6 Ideas: Encourage people to make the most of he opportunity to befriend the people they are living with. This postcard offers a few suggestions that might be a nice, easy way to get the flat together and get to know one another.

2. To share

Food & drinks: Why not get the flat together and prepare them a meal, we have started you off with a meal idea. Or make a hot chocolate for your neighbors and hang out. These edible items are in the box for you to share with others.

Recipe book: Beyond Beans & Toast provides a few recipes with stories from students. Perhaps you could encourage new students to cook a meal from this book for their flatmates? This could be an opportunity to try something like a Meal-with-a-Message.

3. To equip

Other books: Everything so far sounds good on paper, but it might all seem a bit intimidating for new students to do. In Have No Fear, John Lennox explains practically how we can winsomely share Jesus with our friends, despite our fears.

UCCF resources: Last but not least, we have created the Starting Uni Journal for you to work through in your first few days of uni. It's a devotional that helps new student think about key key things like identity, finding a church, making friends, sharing your faith and offering a reflecting journal to walk through these things prayerfully and with scripture at the heart.

Pitching it to your CU

Now you have a good rundown of what’s in the pack and how to use it, here are a few ideas of how you could incorporate these packs with your CU’s freshers’ week plans: