Advisors’ moment-to-moment awareness of what is happening in an advising session can have a positive impact on the experience for our students and for ourselves. Thus it is helpful when advisors understand the benefits of mindfulness practice in academic advising and the ways in which we can formally practice mindfulness in our daily routines.
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For advisors spring is a time to re-energize and enhance our advising skills so we are better prepared to help our advisees succeed. A great re-energizing step is attending NACADA Regional Conferences where we can meet advising colleagues from across our regions.
Spring is finally here and with it comes a multitude of NACADA events and resources that not only support the student success, retention, and persistence efforts at campuses across the globe, but also provide all academic advisors with the professional development and skills needed to increase the success of students.
This article discusses an analytical approach to the collection and analysis of data in academic advising and provides examples of the use of quantitative data within advising practice at International Christian University (ICU).
If you haven’t attended a NACADA Summer institute, do it! It is a phenomenal opportunity to learn about academic advising and to connect with people from colleges and universities from across the globe.
Many of today’s academic advisors are overwhelmed by the number of students in their advising loads and their responsibility to help these students develop academically and personally...When addressing the challenges of managing today’s large advising loads, academic advisors can benefit tremendously from categorizing their advisees, identifying specific student needs within these categories, selecting appropriate advising formats, and utilizing available resources.
Advisors have the freedom to choose to be at one of four levels within our discipline: advising practitioner, emerging professional, advising professional, or advising scholar.
When advisors understand the role of budgeting, how to manage budgets carefully, ethically and creatively, and learn to “speak the language” of budgeting, we can preserve funding and serve students even in the “lean times.”
Wikis can be used as informational mediums for advisor training and development, provide a location to store and maintain institutional and departmental policies and procedures, and provide a digital space where departmental and university calendars can be posted and updated on a daily basis.
I strongly encourage all academic advisors to attend a NACADA Summer Institute during your career. You will be encouraged and motivated; you will learn new skills and be introduced to comprehensive resources. You will discover a wealth of wisdom, assistance, and knowledge from all you meet.
From June 2005 through December 2011, this publication was titled Academic Advising Today: Lighting Student Pathways. Articles included in these archived editions will be presented in a compiled version as well as broken down into individual articles to facilitate search capacity. News features from this period may be attained by contacting the Managing Editor.
It is my hope that students’ memory of me is not as an advisor sitting behind a desk, poring over Banner reports and paper files. I hope the image in their mind’s eye is of me walking, or running, somewhere on campus. I hope they remember me conversing with others and having an open door, because there is no door. I hope my example challenges them as professionals to be as accessible to their clients, patients, or students as I have tried to be for them.
For NACADA, this has definitely been a busy and exciting time... Many exciting ventures are in the works, and I look forward to sharing the outcomes of those efforts in future publications and at the Annual Conference in Denver this October.
Three primary lessons have been learned in the years since Louisiana State University Eunice’s Pathways to Success program began: (1) students follow directions if they know what to do, (2) the program is labor intensive, and (3) communication, cooperation, and consensus-building are crucial.
Students with Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) are arriving on college campuses in greater numbers. While the reason for this increase can be debated, the need to develop skills to work with these students cannot be. Advisors – whether professional or faculty – can play a significant role in helping these students realize success both inside and outside the classroom.
Ellyn Schwartzbauer was diagnosed with Asperger’s Syndrome (AS) in 8th grade. This article is based upon a paper written by Ellyn as part of a Developmental Psychology course requirement at the College of St. Benedict in St. Joseph, MN. As a successful college student with AS, she wishes to promote awareness of AS to college academic advisors.
In just a few short weeks, NACADA members from across the globe will gather for our Annual Conference held this year in Denver. It is an exciting time for the Association each year as we share best practices in the field of academic advising and student success, hear results of the latest research and its implications for the field, and network with old friends and new colleagues...
The program developed by the COSUAC demonstrates that Schwenn (2010) and Pasquini (2010) were correct in suggesting that technology can play a role in advisor training and development by providing an easier and more efficient way for advisors to absorb the informational component of the job. Online informational training allows trainers to spend more time focusing on conceptual and relational aspects of advising, thus moving advisor development closer to the ideal envisioned by Brown (2008).
While developing the blog, we kept in mind two main goals: create original and relevant content, and provide a welcoming and empowering virtual space to help students academically succeed..
NACADA members who seek professional development and recognize the importance of networking with others in the field will find LI to be a valuable resource for themselves and their students.
In this new era of online education, traditional models of academic advising may not be suitable for advisors serving nontraditional students.
Advisors have an opportunity to dramatically increase pregnant and parenting students’ chances of academic success, retention, and persistence. Preparation for advising a pregnant or parenting student will help advisors respond supportively and provide needed tools to help parenting students successfully navigate the dual roles of being a student and parent.
