The 21st Annual MAP/MRO Conference held at VSU

The 21st annual Minority Advising Program/ Minority Recruitment Office (MAP/MRO) Spring Conference will be held March 24-25, at the University Center on the campus of Valdosta State University.

The theme of this year's conference, "Providing Support Strategies to Enhance Retention and Graduation," issues a challenge and call to action that further emphasizes the concurrent goals of MAP/MRO and those of the University System as a whole. The main goals of MAP/MRO are to successfully recruit, advise, and foster the maturation of undergraduate minority students.

The Minority Advising Program and the Minority Recruitment Plan were established in 1983 to address the specific problems faced by minority students with the University System of Georgia that affected their recruitment and retention. MAP coordinators later developed direct linkage with the Minority Recruitment Officers and developed the annual conference. The conference presented the first system-wide effort to provide professional staff development, improve program success strategies, and encourage general information sharing in the areas of minority recruitment and retention.

This year's conference will have standardized testing workshops for students and mentoring guidelines for the retention of MAP/MRO personnel. Michael Thurmond, Commissioner of the Georgia Department of labor is this year's featured speaker. Thurmond is scheduled to speak at 12:15 p.m. on Thursday, March 24.