FAQ

OU Cousins is a program that fosters building lifelong friendships and cultural exchange between American and international student communities at OU. Through the program, American students and exchange/international students are matched based on age, majors, hobbies, and interests. OU Cousins hosts a variety of events throughout the semester, but students are additionally encouraged to meet outside.

Our main form of matching is through our Matching Party that is held at the beginning of each semester. However, if you are unable to attend the Matching Party, we will provide a survey to fill out with your major(s), interests, hobbies, etc. From here, the Advisory Board will match you with someone who has similar characteristics.

Contacting your OU cousin is the responsibility of both Cousins! When you receive your email with your match, both Cousins should email the other to discuss the best ways to communicate. Exchange social media, phone numbers, etc. If you have contacted your Cousin and have still not heard back after one week, please email oucousins@ou.edu and we will try to match you with someone new.

Yes! You can have multiple Cousins. This ensures that everyone who wishes to participate in the program is able to. However, we cannot always ensure that we will have an equal number of international/exchange students and American students. If you choose to match with multiple Cousins, we ask that you do your best to work with your Cousins to attend events together and meet up in-person! If at any point you are no longer able to spend time with your Cousin(s), please email oucousins@ou.edu.

If at any point you no longer are able to participate in OU Cousins, please let your Cousin know ahead of time and email oucousins@ou.edu so we may rematch your Cousin.

While we encourage everyone to officially match with a Cousin, most of our events are open to all students. OU Cousins works hard to be inclusive, so if your friend, roommate, or family member wants to tag along to an event, they are more than welcome! However, if you regularly attend our events, we do ask that you fill out our email sign-up form. This helps both our matching process and allows us to track our number of participants, so we can plan our events for the correct number of people. 

OU Cousins hosts approximately 2-3 free or low-cost events each month, both on and off campus. These events are intended to guide your experience with OU Cousins and provide great opportunities to meet up with your Cousin. However, the OU Cousins experience is so much more than these events! If you are unable to attend an event, just let your Cousin know, and plan something to do together outside of our events! Our events are only half the fun of being an OU Cousin and you are strongly encouraged to spend time with your Cousin outside of our events. 

We encourage you to be creative! Our best advice is to treat your Cousin like your friend. Invite your Cousin to get lunch on campus, come over for a movie night, OU sporting events, or to hang out with your friends! Organize a trip somewhere around the U.S. that you both want to visit! We recommend to try new things together! You may find that you and your Cousin both love the same kind of food or have a unique hobby in common, so get to know each other! Introduce your Cousin to activities or foods they might not find in their home country.

OU Cousins focuses on the student experience, but if OU faculty and staff members are looking for ways to get involved with or support the program, they should email oucousins@ou.edu for recommendations for how they can best do so.