Like many academic advisors, I occasionally receive email messages from former students who are somewhat disillusioned by their first post-graduation jobs and speak with some nostalgia about their alma mater. After all, finding a job, meeting workplace expectations, relocating, seeking new friends, and planting roots are all hard work. This unsettling life transition is the theme of the Broadway musical, Avenue Q (Lopez, Marx, and Whitty, 2003), which was written for the twenties generation finding their way in an uncertain world. Avenue Q can be fictitiously found in the furthest and least expensive borough of New York City.
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Great law school applications don’t start with a high LSAT score. They come from years of engagement with academics, the community, and an understanding of what the study and the profession of law is really about. Get your freshmen started right by incorporating this eight point “academic advising curriculum” into your work with first-year pre-law students.
Academic advisors must be in tune with the remarkable changes unfolding in today’s workplace. By expanding or refining their career advising competencies they can play a vital role in helping students understand the importance of educational and career goal setting and how the decisions they make in college might influence satisfaction and success in their future personal and work lives.
Preparing students for a career is not higher education’s primary focus. However, the question is understandable. We expect an action to produce an outcome, a direction. “Undecided” insinuates unknowing, and unknowing suggests lack of direction. We stress the need for critical thinking, developing transferable skills, immersion in learning situations, and studying a topic in-depth, i.e., the importance of college for the intellectual experience itself. Nonetheless, the anxiety over what happens the Monday after graduation weighs heavily from day one for students (and their parents); thus it demands our attention.
In the process of developing an academic and career plan, it is important for advisors to help students understand how their career fits in the context of their future. The context involves a workplace that is changing and a future that will likely provide less security, an increased level of competitiveness, and an increased rate of change. Gordon (2006) stated that 'now as never before, academic advisors need to be in tune with the changing workplace and the many factors influencing it' (p. viii) and to use this knowledge to enhance their advising and facilitate students' academic and career planning.
Over the past year, full time and faculty advisors have had an opportunity to meet in informal settings at the state, regional and national conferences to discuss areas of concern in advising Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) students. During these discussions, advisors have identified many challenges that confront them when advising this designated population. Some of these challenges will be addressed in the following discussion.
However, based on my research, I would add a supplemental advising approach that incorporates aspects of Bandura’s (1989) four sources of self-efficacy.
Academic and career advisors must keep up with economic forecasts to help students with career planning and to pay particular attention to the special needs that students may have in a down economy...Advisors who encourage students to gain practical experience, expand their skill sets, and remain flexible give students the tools needed to react to the range of economic cycles they will experience in their lifetime.
There are four key areas where academic advisors need to be bold. Hang tight on these, and you will fulfill the NACADA values. More importantly, you will serve your advisees well.
As advisors, we tell our liberal arts and social science students to “follow your heart” and “study what you love” in college. But, when it comes to career advising, how do we help these students “follow their hearts” to career success?
Those of us who advise students nearing the end of their degree, certificate, or training programs know that there is good news and bad news connected with advising these students.
As an “arts” advisor, I frequently speak with parents about the “practicality” of an arts degree. Many parents want to know exactly what their student can “do” with a degree in Music, Theatre, or Dance...Parents need assistance to see that the skills the student learns in an arts program have merit in non-arts fields.
Career decision making can be complicated and overwhelming for both students and advisors...Yet, as we all know, the process of solving career problems is intertwined intrinsically with developing sound academic plans and naturally spills over into the academic advising arena...
Female undergraduate students outnumber their male counterparts, yet there is a great underrepresentation of women in majors considered to be traditionally male. This has led to a disproportionately small number of women in STEM areas of concentration: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. These disparities persist despite women’s interest in STEM fields. It is crucial for colleges and universities to impact those statistics by counteracting the factors that enforce gender roles.
Advising dialogue in the humanities should address how master’s students can continue to stay relevant in the job market as they pursue their studies. By developing an advising plan that advocates both academic and professional options, starting at the bachelor’s level and continuing all the way to the doctoral level, students will be able to better demonstrate how vital the humanities are to society, both artistically and professionally.
In this culture of evidence, the career development of college students becomes critical for academic advisors. Providing opportunities for college students to develop their career interests while in college can have a positive impact on college outcomes. The author suggests three simple strategies academic advisors can develop to weave career advising into their work.
The author finds that the use of collaborative note writing changes the one directional aspect of advising notes while staying true to the original purpose.
Although the blended position is known by various names in different institutions, there is one underlying factor: the incumbents do more than academic advising, while building relationships towards student success.
Whether a student is attending a community college, a private liberal arts college, or anything in between, the inclusion of career competency or soft skill development into conversations with undecided students is important because it sets students up to apply, transfer, and integrate various aspects of their experiences.
During the summer, the staff of Academic and Career Development at IUPUI works closely with other institutional offices to offer two-day orientation programs for incoming first-year students.
In today’s 21st century economy, it is no longer enough for advisors to help students choose a major and craft a course schedule. Advisors need to help students create a step-by-step plan for achieving their long-term goals and preparing for unexpected barriers along the way. Thus, career advising is now an important function of academic advising.
While students routinely report that the primary reason they attend college is to get a better job, few start with the end in mind. If academic advisors are to better engage students in career advising curriculum, they must weave it into all advising. This integration is difficult, but possible.
HBCUs have been leaders in producing and leading African American students toward health professions. Advisors must recognize HBCUs like a catalyst for change and bastion of future health professionals that need to be cultivated and mentored.
It is important for advisors to help art students shift their preoccupation with career trend forecasts and look at the lifelong arc of their pursuit in the arts. A focus on life’s work expands students’ perspectives.
Advising in the liberal arts needs to make a fundamental shift in the definition of advising towards a model of integrating career and academic advising and changing what advising is for student success.
