Welcome home, JAMS LLC.

Bright, smiling faces beaming with eager excitement to start the year, parents tearing up as they send off their child to somewhere unknown and foreign, and I sit in the lounge and watch as a thousand different emotions swirl around me over the period of three hours: this was my first experience meeting my residents on move in day. My name is Maggie Polsean and I am the Resident Assistant for the Journalism, Advertising and Media Studies Living Learning Community. I get the esteem pleasure to help guide my residents through the one of the craziest transitions in their lives and also get to help teach them about their chosen career path along the way.

My meet-me-board on the floor before photos and information was added.

As I watched and helped my residents move in on the first day, I couldn't help but think, "Wow. This is the coolest thing I will ever get to do during my college career." You see, working with students and helping them to achieve goals is a passion of mine, but so is journalism. When I came to UWM as a JAMS major, unsure of what I wanted to do with the degree, I quickly found myself falling head-over-heels for the fast-paced, informative world of journalism. While that was unforgettable and extremely comforting in my mind, I was missing something. I felt like I was solid in my choice of major and knew where I wanted to head with it, but something was still missing: the opportunity to help people.

Yes, in journalism you do help people, informing the public on issues, events, breaking news, etc., but there isn't a direct, face-to-face connection to the help you are providing. When I learned that the JAMS LLC RA from last year was graduating, something in me sparked; I could become an RA and fill that something missing, that passion of helping others I want to pursue. So, eight months later, through the hiring process and training, here I am; thrilled to be the RA for the JAMS LLC, after being a resident in it last year, and I am ready to get the year started!

The residents have been in the halls for about three weeks now and they have already started getting involved: five have joined the UWM Post, our student-run newspaper, almost all of our LLC has been to involvement fairs and joined various clubs, and they all hangout in our floor lounge 24/7 talking and watching movies together. The year has already been filled with laugher, memories and experiences my residents will never forget.

One of the bulletin boards on the floor to help encourage the residents to go out and make new friends.

The biggest thing we have done so far as an LLC is attend welcome week activities together. Residents had a blast this year at Pantherfest, Academic Welcome Day, soccer games, involvement fairs and other university-sponsored events. Below, you can see some of our residents dying t-shirts at the first home men's soccer game.

As the year continues, I know that our LLC will keep hanging out, being involved and having fun. Their already doing an outstanding job and I know it will just keep getting better!

Meet your JAMS LLC Peer Mentor: Steven Stojanovic

Hello UWM Living Learning Communities,

My name is Stevan Stojanovic and I am the mentor for the JAMS LLC. I am originally from Brookfield, Wisconsin and a senior majoring in JAMS and pursuing a certificate in Russian and Eastern European Studies.

This LLC can help students get excited in the world of Journalism and Public Relations, or just as excited as I am to be the mentor of the LLC. I think that being involved in a LLC is important because it gets first year students to connect with other people who are in the same class and studying the same field. Plus they get to learn a lot about their field by visiting a radio and TV station and having guest speakers who are from the field they want to get in.

The experience that I will bring to the LLC is that I have interned at multiple places such as News/Talk 1130 WISN (the home of UWM Panther Men's Basketball), WisPolitics.com, Milwaukee Magazine, and Lake Country Publications. By interning at all these places I hope to bring the experience to help let the students know all of the cool things they can do in journalism.