All new master’s degree and doctoral students will be invited to attend Graduate Student Orientation, a program designed to introduce essential, University-level resources through brief presentations, panels, a resource fair, and breakout sessions. This event is intended to help students adjust to navigating the University by providing a broad overview of information and resources. This is meant to complement the program-specific information from department and school-level orientations. 

The Graduate School will host Orientation for all incoming on-campus students on Wednesday, August 12, 2026. You will receive email invitations from them at a later date. Details, as well as pre-orientation online modules, can be found on their website.

MPA Orientation will be held on at the School of Government (Knapp-Sanders Building) on Friday, August 14th. Please block the entire day to attend, as events will run approximately 8:30 am- 7 pm. The last few hours are social in nature, though!

The orientation day’s activities will include information and introductions that will help you navigate the upcoming year.  You will also get acquainted with members of your cohort, the faculty and MPA staff.  We have planned a day that we hope will be fun as well as informative.

Other Orientation Events:

• Military-Affiliated Grad Students Boot Print to Heel Print Onboarding: TBD
  • This onboarding is for new military-affiliated (active duty, veterans, National Guard, and Reserves) graduate and professional students. All graduate and professional students who indicated a military-affiliation on their application have been invited to this onboarding event. Military-affiliated students should also check out the Student Veteran Resource Center.
• GLOBAL GRADS: (New International Graduate Students) TBD
  • This welcome session is an opportunity for our new international graduate and professional students to learn more about Global Grads and UNC. In addition, there will be a panel of current Global Grads who will be able to answer their questions on what it is like to be an international graduate student at UNC. They will share their advice on what worked best for them and some challenges they may have faced since arriving at UNC.
• First Day of Classes: Monday, August 17, 2026
• Meet the 2nd Year MPA Students & Student Organization Fair: TBD
• Research Assistant Orientation: TBD
• MPA Alumni Kickoff Picnic, Saturday, August 22, 2026- come out for this free event, and feel free to bring roommates, significant others, etc! Registration will be open closer to the event.

About ONYENs

Creating your ONYEN is the very first thing you should do as it is required for access to many of the student systems you will use.

“Onyen” is the name for UNC’s campus-wide identifier that you can use to gain access to various electronic resources on campus. Although it is a word, you can think of it as an acronym for the “only name you’ll ever need.” The distinctive name is intended to prevent confusing it with the myriad other user ids that exist across campus. Several factors make it stand out from these other user identification schemes:

• Onyens are the only electronic service keys available to all members of the campus community — faculty, staff, and students alike. (There are about 45,000 of them right now.)
• Every Onyen is associated with a particular person via his or her PID.
• Each Onyen has its own password which can be used over secure connections for encrypted sessions to Web and other servers across campus.
• Although Onyens are managed by one department (ITS), they are available for use as authentication keys to any campus department or group which has to allocate resources to University affiliated people. Yet these groups are freed from having to administer the creation of user ids or the management of passwords.

With these factors in mind, Onyens represent a significant part of the commitment by Information Technology Services to provide equitable campus-wide access to a range of ITS and other services. As technology permits, Onyen based access will be used for an increasing number of services both within ITS and across campus.

UNC students, staff and faculty can visit the Onyen home page to create and manage their Onyens, to subscribe to Onyen services, and use Onyen functions.

***Please keep your contact information updated, including the phone number used for Alert Carolina emergency alerts. This may be done via the ONYEN password update page. 

UNC Email Address

If you have not done so already, please set up your UNC email address. Your UNC email address will be used for the listserv that will be created for the new class, which we will use to communicate with you over the summer and throughout the program. Susan Lynch will send a test email to the listserv at the end of May and we will start using it for communicating with the class going forward.  Email is considered the official form of correspondence from the university, so it’s very important that you set up this account and check it regularly.

Registration

Fall 2026 term registration will open in March 2026. UNC-CH’s student services registration system is called ConnectCarolina.  ConnectCarolina operates best in Internet Explorer or Firefox and uses a tab system for navigation.  Two key features are offered for course planning:  the Shopping Cart and Planner.  Log-in for online registration is through the MyUNC portal and requires use of your ONYEN and password for enrollment.  Once you have logged in, select Student Center and this will be your individualized portal for registration, course searches, grades, and financial accounts.

NOTE:  If the Graduate School has not received your official transcript(s) you will not be able to register for classes until you have submitted them to the Graduate School and the hold has been removed.

Registration Periods

You will be able to register online or tweak your schedule beginning now and continuing through the first week of class. However, if you do not register prior to the first day of classes (August 17), a $20 late registration fee will automatically be charged to you.

You have the option of taking four or five courses during your initial semester, this includes the required four core courses and an optional elective.  Elizabeth Langefeld, Director of Academic Advising and Student Life, will discuss with you elective offerings and course sequencing during your initial advising appointment. To schedule with Elizabeth, please see her Bookings Page.

We recommend you read through the On-Campus Academics page prior to your appointment.

How to Order Textbooks

Textbooks are available from UNC Student Stores located in the Daniels Building. For questions regarding textbooks used for specific courses – including online ordering – please follow the link to the UNC Student Stores’ textbook information and ordering webpage or call (919) 962-5024.

OR

From the ConnectCarolina portal page, click “More Student Links” section, select the “Buy Books from UNC Student Stores” prompt.  Log in using your ONYEN and password to find textbooks for your registered courses.

If you are using scholarship funds to purchase course materials, you must order them through Student Stores. Faculty are required to notify Student Stores each term of required course materials. If you are purchasing materials with other funds, you may purchase from other vendors. UNC Student Stores price matches with Amazon and other vendors, with certain restrictions:

• They match prices on books sold and shipped by Amazon, not third-party sellers.

• • Please see screenshots below for examples. The one on top is an example of when the price would not be matched, and the one on the bottom would be price matched.
  • 

• The price match applies only if the edition (ISBN) and condition (new or used) of the book are the same.

UNC One Card

The UNC One Card is a multipurpose identification and on-line accounts card. You can use it for anything on campus from after-hours access to Knapp-Sanders to paying for lunch at UNC Dining Locations. It is the official ID card for students, faculty, & staff of The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Your One Card provides access to certain facilities & events and also serves as your UNC Library card.

All newly issued One Cards will be mobile One Cards. Physical cards will be issued on a case-by-case basis. Should you need a physical card, please come to the third floor of Student Stores Building and bring the One Card fee ($10) and a driver’s license, passport or military ID.

How to get a MOBILE One Card

Follow These Steps (in order)

1. Make sure that you have your ONYEN, UNC-Chapel Hill email and DUO set up, otherwise you won’t be able to log in.
2. Complete the One Card electronic signature to sign the One Card Use Agreement.
3. Upload a photo for your One Card and a valid photo ID – driver’s license, state ID card, or passport.
4. Download and set up the UNC GET App. This app is for viewing meal plan and account balances, ordering meals and loading funds to your Carolina Convenience Accounts.
5. After your uploaded photo has been approved, open the UNC GET App.
6. Select the “Add to Wallet” button, then select next.

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, along with all the other UNC system campuses, requires both graduate and undergraduate students to have health insurance coverage.  Eligible students are required to show evidence of an existing “creditable” health insurance policy or you will be automatically enrolled in and billed for the UNC system-wide student health insurance plan. 

Note to students with an RA: The insurance plan for research assistants is different than the system-wide plan.  Please wait to hear from Susan Lynch in the summer for enrollment instructions for the RA plan and do not enroll in the system-wide plan.

The UNC Cashier’s Office bills tuition, fees and other campus-based charges to students. Electronic bills are issued around the 16th of each month and will be due the next month. Tuition, fees and other charges for the term are due prior to the first day of classes for the term. Interim bills include other charges incurred during the term. Enrolled students and Authorized Users will receive email notification when bills are available in the ConnectCarolina Student Center.

The MPA Program will provide to the UNC Cashier’s Office a list of all newly admitted students who are receiving departmental aid.  However, the award entry system usually does not open until the first week of August.  Because the Fall bills are created mid-July, at that time students can either;

1. make an official request for deferment of payment
   or
2. subtract your departmental award from the total and pay the difference

If you decide to defer, detailed instructions may be found here. If you do not pay the bill or request deferment by the indicated deadline on your bill, your fall courses will be canceled and you must repeat the registration process again.

NOTE: Students who do not register before the July 18th billing date must prepay or provide proof of departmental aid prior to registering. Again, you are strongly encouraged to register as soon as possible.

For those students who are also receiving federal financial aid, once your departmental award has been entered into the system, it then usually takes a couple of days for financial aid to re-work your package.  If you have any questions regarding loans, contact the Office of Scholarships & Student Aid at (919) 962-8396, or email aidinfo@unc.edu.

Please feel free to contact Elizabeth Langefeld if you have any questions regarding any of the above information.

Student Success Planning:

As a part of continued onboarding and student support, students will be asked to set up student success planning call with Elizabeth Langefeld during the summer before the start of the fall term. The purpose of this 30-45 minute session is to identify strengths and challenges students may face in the program, and then use those strengths and challenges to develop academic goals to remain focused on the student’s success in the program. To set up this advising appointment, please see Elizabeth’s Bookings Page.

Before this appointment, please read the On-Campus Academics Page. During the appointment, you will start your MPA Course Planner. Please see the Course Planner page for information on utilizing this resource.

Note: your ONYEN must be set up in order to access the Course Planner.

Transcript Hold

Transcript Hold

You can view which transcripts are missing by going into your StudentCenter in ConnectCarolina and viewing the “Admissions Items” under the “To Do List” These will need to be in by the time you register for next term or you will find a hold on your account and you will not be able to register until this has been submitted

 How to Register:

• Students use Connect Carolina to register as well as view information on their course history, academic record, financial account, etc.
  • Information on using Connect Carolina and instructions on how to register can be found here.
  • In order to log in to Connect Carolina, students must have already set up an ONYEN and e-mail.

What to Register For:

• Students should register for the following four required core courses for the fall term:
  • PUBA 709-001 – Foundations of Public Administration
  • PUBA 719-001 – Public Administration Analysis and Evaluation I
  • PUBA 721-001 – Professional Communications
  • PUBA 760-001 – Law for Public Administrators

• You also have the option of taking a fifth course during your initial semester, which would include an elective. Elizabeth Langefeld can discuss with you elective offerings and course sequencing during your initial advising appointment.
• Students who have earned a J.D. are waived from PUBA 760 but need to replace it with another elective. Details can be discussed during your advising appointment.

Questions?

• If there are specific issues with registering for classes in the first term (such as holds or system error messages), please contact Elizabeth Langefeld.
• For additional information on advising and registration resources, please visit the on-campus enrolled student resource page with the Carolina MPA Intranet.

The following will be important to helping you be successful at UNC:

1. Download the Carolina Ready App and become familiar with its features
2. Read through the MPA Communications Guide to understand how to best communicate with the Program and stay on top of important announcement
3. Start the North Carolina Residency process, if applicable.
4. Join Heels Engage: The MPA community is an amazing network of strong, committed, and passionate public service leaders. To help facilitate student and alumni connecting and networking, we encourage you to participate in UNC’s new alumni platform called Heels Engage. Connect with fellow students and alumni, engage in discussions, and expand your network. Heels Engage offers a focused space exclusively for UNC students and alumni, and the UNC MPA Group is exclusive to MPA alumni and students, making it a relevant and meaningful way to stay connected. If you are looking to connect or would like to be a resource for other students or alumni—as a mentor or for job search support—this platform is a great place to do so.
5. Check out the MPA Student Hub in Canvas (you’ll be added after your ONYEN is available). The Hub is a space created to support peer connection across both formats of the MPA Program. Think of the Hub as your go-to space to connect with fellow MPA students—whether you’re online or on-campus. It’s built for students, by students and staff—a place to build community, share experiences, and stay in the loop. Here’s what you’ll find there:
   1. MPA Student Directory: Browse the full list of students who have created a profile and connect directly. Because this is new, we need as many of you as possible to create a profile to make this a useful tool. You will be able search and filter by career interests, location, and more.
      1. 👉 Action item: Take 3 minutes to create your profile in the student directory (Pro tip: You can connect your LinkedIn profile to auto-populate your information.)
   2. Discussion Boards, Affinity Groups, and Interest Groups: Join conversations and connect with others who have similar backgrounds, experiences or interests as you.
   3. Student Organizations and Other Leadership Opportunities: Learn about student organizations, leadership roles, and ways to get involved.
   4. Program Calendar: Stay on top of key dates and events.
   5. “Where do I go if I have questions?”: Unsure who to contact? This section guides you to the right person.
   6. Program Platform Quick Links: Unsure where to find something? This page outlines all the key platforms we use, what they’re for, and how to access them—your go-to guide when in doubt.

📌 Bookmark the Hub and visit regularly—our hope is that it becomes one of the most valuable tools for making the most of your time in the program.

UNC-CH Websites of Interest

The Graduate and Professional Student Government provides a very comprehensive guide for students as you transition into Graduate School. Please review the list of resources offered at UNC and the surrounding community.

Relevant presentations and resources will be added to this section after orientation.

MPA Procedures