Amberniqua Iglehart

English 1023.10

Donna Souder

7 May 2007

The Untold Reality Behind Academic Advising

Each summer, Texas Woman’s University holds orientations for new, incoming students.  These sessions are generally intended for freshman students; however, a few orientations are available for transfer and graduate students who are new to the Denton campus.  Before my first semester at TWU, I attended an orientation session which consisted of tours, placement exams, and registering for classes.  The registration process seemed to last forever.  An orientation leader led my group of people who were aiming towards a similar major as me, to a two story building at the end of campus.  In a large lecture room, approximately sixty people sat and waited to see an adviser.  Each person was assigned an adviser based on their last names in order to give each adviser an equal number of advisees which would allow the advisers to have similar amounts of work.  I remember my advisement meeting like it was yesterday.  I sat down and handed the woman my documentation of my past educational experiences so she has a better understanding as of where I was and where I wanted to be.  The woman first asked me questions about what I would be majoring in the following semester and analyzed the results of the test I had previously taken the morning before.  I began to feel very uncomfortable about allowing this woman to decide my future.  This woman knew nothing about me.  All she knows were the results of a test I had taken with no preparations.  I wondered how this adviser figured she knew me well enough from the other hundred of freshman being advised to determine what was too many hours for my first semester, as well as, what classes were going to be best for me to take.  I left my meeting with my adviser feeling unconfident about my schedule that I had been registered for.  “Academic advising has been viewed traditionally and almost universally as being of poor quality.  Indeed, on the majority of college campuses, quality academic advising programs have been virtually nonexistent,” (Wilder 189).  It was not just my personal advisement experience that happened to be a waste of time several others have had this problem.  Miriam Raskin list example of comments student have had after leaving an advisement session in the article, “The Critical Issue: Faculty Advising”.  She states, “My faculty adviser does not seem to understand me or my problem well enough to advise me.  My faculty adviser does not seem to understand the curriculum.  [Also] my faculty adviser never seems to know the requirements and usually send me elsewhere” as comments students are commonly having.  Academic advising is important, however, certain critique should be implemented for those being advised in order to improve the conditions and cause it to be more effective.

In the article, Advising Means Administration, Esther Allen Gaw, states, “Any definition of an adviser as being a kind of angel out of heaven endowed with all good human traits and no weaknesses, and exerting great influence over the advisee, is an entirely ludicrous one” (179-180).  An academic adviser is a person that a student goes to in order to get advice and information on their academic career. 

“Advising takes considerable time, energy, and attention to detail.  Each student comes to his or her adviser with a different route to graduation.  The successful advise learns to treat every student as an individual and does the homework needed to ensure that the advice given is accurate and reliable” (Mortenson 26). 

The roles of an adviser are not simple.  Unlike the idea that most people have developed about advising, the occupation is one that consists of work and research done outside the office walls.  An academic adviser must be compassionate about what he or she does in order to be successful.  A good adviser is helpful to each and every student that he or she may advise.  Advisers must research each student that enters their office.  Research consists of knowing how well the student has performed on past test such as the SAT, ACT, THEA, etc.  Also, acknowledging the outside of school activities that the student may have is important.  If an adviser knows what the student is going to be doing, he or she will have a better understanding of what course load will suit him or her better.  “…One must become familiar with the university’s catalog requirement and with various other procedures to ensure a student’s eventual achievement of a degree” (Mortenson 26). 

Knowing what requirements must be achieved to attain a degree is a must for academic advisers.  Once an adviser knows and understands the importance of their job, it is possible that he or she will take it more seriously.  Advisers determine the student body’s future rather they choose to accept it or not.  How well the students are advised determines the likeliness of the majority of the college or universities to graduate.  “The whole college knows when a professor misses a class; but it is one girl who pays the price, perhaps even without knowing it, if her counselor is not available or not alert.  For these reasons, it is crucially important that the counseling function be vested in persons both fully trained and specifically assigned” (White 314).  An adviser’s role in their students’ lives is more important they most people realize.  The most important aspect of academic advising would have to be the fact that they allow the student to have security in their college experience.  “Whether considered a necessity or not, social support provided by college and universities is a critical variable in the educational experience” (Davis 622).  Most first year students, as well as some upper graduates, need a wiser person’s opinion on certain issues, this one being their schedule or graduation plan, before they feel comfortable enough with it. 

Academic advising has shown to be a beneficial aspect to the college experience.  However, through in-depth research it has show to be unsuccessful today and in past years.  Cooper and Fobian states, “It does appear that college students do not typically engage in self-initiated long-range planning to an extent appropriate given the complex nature of curriculum requirements” (100).  If not told to or helped along the way, a student may not consider long term goals.  It is crucial for the future to be considered while attending college and throughout life.  Another problem assessed was the fact that, “all students should specify majors at the beginning of their enrollment in the first semester, but they may change from one major to the other until they discover which fits their needs.  Appropriate advice is therefore vital to academic progress” (Al-Mannie 229).  Believe it or not, there are students who attend college and are not sure what they want to do with the rest of their lives.  When a student changes his or her major, it is difficult for a person to provide them with advice as to what they should do.  Information can be given to help them attain the degree the student may desire, however, if it’s changed, the advice become pointless. 

In the article, “Academic Advisement: An Untapped Resource” by Jerry Wilder, the problems of academic advising are determined.  It states: 

“Academic advisers are not readily accessible to their advisees; the academic advising function is considered minimally important by advisers themselves; academic advisers are not trained adequately to discharge their responsibilities; academic advisers rarely posses up-to-date information about their advisees; academic advisers frequently are assigned more advisees than they can advise effectively; academic advisers often do not relate well to their advises, academic advisers rarely are compensated or recognized for their advising responsibilities; and academic advising is not considered an important institutional activity” (189-190). 

The on-going problems of academic advising are known by many who have researched the issue; however, minimum effort is being made to improve the conditions.  In order to better the advising programs throughout the country, the administrators should staff enough advisers on each campus. 

Helen White expresses, “freshman academic advising, apart from remedial reading, and so on, would be done by a small number of faculty members (in proportion of one to about thirty Freshmen) who would be specially selected for this duty and would be freed from a corresponding amount of classroom teaching” (315).  Assigning advisers to specific degree plans may also improve the quality of the sessions.  With an adviser that has expertise at one certain degree plan; the adviser will know more as to what the student needs to do in order to graduate with the degree he or she is trying to attain.  Limiting the criteria for required academic advising sessions may satisfy the portion of the student body that does not feel they need to be advised.  Not making some people attend these sessions may make it impossible for the advisers to not take time out to get to know each of their advisees.  The freshman should have to attend an academic advising session.  However, a student who has been attending college and knows what they are doing do not need to be advised.  Another option that could be considered is having “senior counselors for failing Freshmen” (Gaw 182).  Gaw illustrates the benefits of this option saying it “decreased the proportion of expected failures, but were actually saving money in the administration of advising” (182).  Not only would this be cheaper but students may feel more comfortable being counseled by peers rather than someone that doesn’t experience his or her day to day stressors.  Every individual enrolled at a college or university does not need academic advising but a large percentage do.

There several methods that can be assessed to implement a better advising program for the students of college and university around the country.  Not one particular solution may improve every situation and not every situation needs improvement.  “Richard Meeth, one of a handful of educators studying academic advising in the early 1960s, reported that students enrolled in higher education either did not want academic advisement, did not need it, or were not changed by it” (Wilder 189).  Through in-depth research academic advising has proven to be very useful when performed properly.  In preparations for my second semester at TWU, I attended another session of academic advising.  During the meeting, I learned that my adviser had not informed me of the classes that were required to take before I chose to expand my nursing degree.  My adviser felt that not informing me of the situation was not a “big deal”.  Having to attend an extra semester to attain my basic was what would be best for me; at least that is what she thought.  An extra semester of school was not an option to me.  I was trying to get out of school as soon as possible without any extra time or money spent on attaining my degree.  Due to the fact that this woman assumed instead of getting the knowledge to be able to advise me, I had to deal with twice as much work as I would have had being advised by someone who took the time out to care.  Advising is a serious situation.  In reality, it can make or break someone’s chance of performing to the best of their abilities in school and possibly the real world.

Works Cited

Al-Mannie, Mohammed A.  “Students Perception of Academic Counseling at the King Saud University, Saudi Arabia”.  International Review Education, Vol. 35, No. 2.  (1898), pp. 229-234. 

Cooper, William E, Fobian, Cynthia S.  “Long-Range Course Planning by College Students”.  Higher Education, Vol. 16, No. 1.  (1987), pp. 95-102. 

Davis, James Earl.  “College in Black and White: Campus Environment and Academic Achievement of African American Males”.  The Journal of Negro Education, Vol. 63, No. 4, Pedagogical and Contextual Issues Affecting African American Males in School and Society.  (Autumn, 1994), pp. 620-633. 

Gaw, Esther Allen.  “Advising Mean Administration”.  The Journal of Higher Education, Vol. 4, No. 4.  (Apr., 1933), pp. 179-186. 

Mortenson, Gary C.  “But It’s Not in My Job Description’: The Varied Roles of College Teachers”.  Music Educators Journal, Vol. 74, No. 9.  (May, 1988), pp. 26-30. 

Raskin, Miriam.  “Critical Issue: Faculty Advising”.  Peabody Journal of Education, Vol. 56, No. 2, Issues and Trends in American Education. (Jan. 1979), pp. 99-108.

Walker White, Helen.  “Counseling Women Students”.  The Journal of Higher Education, Vol. 18, No. 6.  (Jun. 1947), pp. 312-316, 337-338. 

Wilder, Jerry R.  “Academic Advisement: An Untapped Resource”.  Peabody Journal of Education, Vol. 58, No. 4, Issues and Trends in American Education.  (Jul., 1981), pp. 188-192.