Joe
Cuseo - Only about one-third of college campuses provide training for
faculty advisors; less than one-quarter require faculty training; and
the vast majority of institutions offering training programs focus solely on
dissemination of factual information, without devoting significant attention to
the identification of the goals or objectives of advising, and the development
of effective advising strategies or relationship skills (Habley, 1988).
The
upshot of the foregoing findings is encapsulated in the following conclusion
reached by Habley (2000), based on his review of findings from five national
surveys of academic advising: “A recurrent theme, found in all five ACT
surveys, is that training, evaluation, and recognition and reward have been,
and continue to be, the weakest links in academic advising throughout the
nation. These important institutional practices in support of quality advising
are at best unsystematic and at worst nonexistent” (p. 40). This conclusion,
based on national surveys, is reinforced by national reports on the status of
American higher education. For instance, a blue-ribbon panel of higher
education scholars working under the auspices of the National Institute of
Education (1984), concluded that, “Advisement is one of the weakest links in
the education of college students” (p. 31). Similarly, a national report issued
by the Carnegie Foundation, based on three years of campus visits and extensive
national survey research, arrived at the following conclusion: “We have found
advising to be one of the weakest links in the undergraduate experience. Only
about a third of the colleges in our study had a quality advisement program
that helped students think carefully about their academic options” (Boyer,
1987, p. 51).
National
reports calling for improvement in the quality of undergraduate education have
repeatedly emphasized the need for instructional development of faculty,
because graduate school typically does no prepare them for college teaching
(National Institute of Education, 1984; Association of American Colleges, 1985;
Wingspread Group, 1993). The very same case could be made for college advising,
because faculty are the most prevalent advisors at all types of colleges and
universities (Lareau, 1996), yet the importance of professional development for
academic advisors has been given short shrift by national reports calling for
higher educational reform. In fact, it is probably safe to say that advising is
the professional role for which faculty are least prepared to perform.
Undoubtedly, faculty receive even less preparation for academic advising during
their graduate school experience than they do for undergraduate teaching. (For
instance, there are no “advising assistantships” in graduate school, as there
are teaching assistantships.) Lack of advisor preparation before entering
the professoriate is subsequently compounded by the lack of substantive
professional development programs for faculty advisors after they enter the
professoriate. Recent national survey results obtained from a sample of
approximately 1000 postsecondary institutions indicate that only 55% of American
colleges and universities provide any type of preparation or training for
advisors of first-year students (
Faculty are, for the most part, powerless to implement developmental advising
without
adequate training. To be an effective developmental
advisor requires sills,
competencies, and knowledge beyond any given academic
discipline. Improving
communication, building relationships, setting goals,
and enhancing knowledge of
campus and community resources are but a few examples
of training areas to which
faculty and other advisor need exposure (p.
106).
Redressing
the underpreparedness of faculty advisors requires systematic design and
delivery of intensive and extensive professional development programs, which
should be more substantive than the common practice of reducing advisor
development to an advising “training” program that begins and ends with a
one-shot, immersion orientation session for new advisors. Orientation needs to
be augmented by professional development seminars and workshops delivered in
person, and supplemented by advisor support delivered in print—in
the form of a carefully constructed and regularly updated “advising handbook.”
A comprehensive advisor handbook should include: (a) current curricular
information (e.g., up-to-date information on course requirements, sequences,
and prerequisites; (b) current information relating to academic policies and
procedures (e.g., procedures for adding/dropping classes and petitioning
for an incomplete or changed grade); (c) student self-help and
self-management strategies (e.g., strategies for learning and time
management ); (d) names, phone numbers, and office hours of key campus- and
community-support services (e.g., learning assistance center, career
development center, personal counseling center, local service-learning
opportunities);and (e) strategies relating to the process of
developmental advising (e.g., student-referral strategies, and concrete
advisor behaviors or practices that effectively implement developmental
advising).
Research
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