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The First-Year Experience Conference was an excellent conference that I would recommend to anyone working with first-year students in any capacity. As I look back on the sessions and put them in a broader context, one of broad concepts that came away with was that first year students (and their parents) are in the middle of an enormous life transition, something that is easy to forget when you see a new batch of first-year students each year. There are many things we can do at the University to facilitate this transition. Another theme I found in the conference was the use of technology to engage first-year students. The participants ranged from administrators at large, public universities to librarians at small private institutions. I even met an administrator for New Zealand! I came away from this conference with a new energy to look for ways to engage students and make then feel a part of our community.