Maintain contact via email or phone, with incoming students to encourage Lakehead as their final choice. Recruitment continues until they arrive and begin studies in Thunder Bay or Orillia, after which retention efforts begin.

Create an email list for all graduate students and stay in touch.

Plan a welcome orientation to:

• Foster a "culture of appreciation" from the start.
• Connect new students with peers and professors.
• Prevent isolation, especially for those from abroad.

Assign Graduate Assistantships (GAs) before students arrive, informing them of their supervisors and duties via email. Submit the Graduate Assistant Assignment of Work to the Office of Graduate Studies by September 30 each fall.

• Ensure that all students in your program are registered and have completed the necessary paperwork for their GA funding and scholarships
• Organize a discipline-specific skills workshop. You may wish to use the services of the Teaching Commons or the Office of Graduate Studies. For new students this workshop should include mentoring in the complexities of applying to the tri-councils (grant writing skills); for continuing students, this workshop (or another one altogether) should be devoted to issues such as preparing a poster for presentation or a manuscript for submission to a conference or a journal, applications to PhD programs, resume writing, etc. The keyword is "Mentor." As graduate coordinator, your primary responsibility is to mentor (or to organize mentoring for) graduate students throughout their learning experience.
• Familiarize yourself with the internal deadline and processes for external grant applications. Be informed about your own program's ranking protocols and ensure they are completed in a timely fashion. Be hypersensitive to deadlines, as late applications are not accepted by the Office of Graduate Studies
• For students: ensure that your students have access to faculty editors when writing their grant application - a faculty member who will read and edit grant applications before they arrive in the Office of Graduate Studies
• For faculty colleagues: remind them that the best reference letters are longer than one sentence, are not hand-written and do not dwell on a student's shortcomings. That is: mentor your colleagues about how to construct a strong and positive letter of reference. When in doubt, ask at the Office of Graduate Studies
• Begin Recruitment planning for the next year (it starts this early!) Develop a poster or program brochure with the aid of the Office of Graduate Studies (we'll ensure that information is OCGS approved); update the program website; develop a form letter about the program and send copies to colleagues elsewhere; ensure that your program colleagues are aware of these materials and that they bring these brochures and/or posters to conferences and symposia
• Familiarize yourself with the application and admission process for the following year. Be sure that your program has a Graduate Studies Committee in place who will handle, in a timely fashion, the applications when they begin to arrive in late Fall, early Winter
• Ensure that every student has been assigned at least one notional supervisor and supervisory committee by the end of their first term at Lakehead

• Familiarize yourself with the Time Extension and Leave of Absence regulations
• Recruit. Don't hesitate to email prospective students. You should not make a firm offer of admission or funding yourself (to avoid liability issues) but do be clear that you will be recommending admission and/or funding support to the Office of Graduate Studies and that the student should feel free to contact you again for more details if needed. 
• Encourage your program's admissions committee to make decisions in a timely fashion. 

• If your program uses External Examiners for the Master's thesis you will need to coordinate and implement the mail outs, reports etc. The Office of Graduate Studies coordinates external examiners only for PhD dissertations
• Review the milestones reached and capstone projects completed for each graduate student in your program to ensure timely completion of the degree. "Times to Completion" are a critical indicator for the MTCU in determining University funding. If your program does not have a coherent set of milestones and deadline dates you may wish to consider introducing these progress indicators
• Delegate a replacement for yourself during vacation periods, conferences, and so on. Be sure to inform the Office of Graduate Studies of the name of your replacement