Imagine that you find yourself having suffered through registration for another semester, only to find that you signed up for Advanced Trigonometry thinking that it would be an easy way to fill up a core math requirement. The reason? You didn’t have the benefit of a faculty advisor helping you along the way.
If something like this has happened to you, you’re not alone.
According to a new poll of Fairfield students, almost half – 42% – ranked their faculty advising as only fair or poor. Only 20% rated it as very good, with 37% calling their advising good.
The low scores didn’t surprise Fairfield administration.
“I’m not happy with these numbers,” said Orin Grossman, the academic vice president of Fairfield. “Faculty advising and mentoring is obviously an important feature of academic life here, and some students perceive that their experience with this advising is not positive,” he said.
“One of the problems that we have is that the university curriculum is very complex. There is a relatively large core, with many options,” said Grossman. “These options can be combined to form minors. There are diversity requirements. Each requirement and option has a good and legitimate reason for its existence, but the sum total is complex enough to confuse many faculty members, not to mention students.”
“I think we need to look at better use of technology. Students should be able to look at their course history and quickly see which requirements they have already fulfilled and which remain to be fulfilled,” said Grossman. “They should be able to do this online.”
Kelly Hackett, ’05, a nursing major, has heard these complaints as well.
“I personally love my advisor, but I’ve heard some horror stories from other people,” Hackett said. “Although I haven’t had a problem with it – school of nursing seems to be good about it.”
The polling seems to concur with Hackett. The School of Nursing students had the highest opinion of their advising of all the students polled, with 80% approving of their advising. Engineering students had the lowest opinion of their advising with just 50% having a positive opinion.
Other students interviewed criticized the lack organization and clarity with the academic advising system at Fairfield, but requested that their names not be mentioned.
The poll was conducted by a joint effort between a sociology and journalism class at Fairfield University. The poll questioned 261 both on campus and off campus students by telephone during the first weekend of November 2002. In theory, in 19 cases out of 20, the results based on such samples will differ by no more than roughly five percentage points in either direction from seeking out all Fairfield students.
Timothy Snyder, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, agrees with Vice President Grossman.
“These numbers [on faculty advising] are a cause for concern. Either student expectations have increased, or the quality of advising has decreased,” said Snyder.
The poll also indicated that the student’s approval of the academic advising went down the longer the students had gone to Fairfield. The freshman polled held a fairly high opinion of the advising they’ve had thus far, with 60% having a generally positive opinion of advising, while just 44% of seniors agreed with the freshman. Snyder offered several explanations.
“There could be many causes for this: an accumulation of memorable bad experiences, a lowered expectation of the newer students,” said Snyder. “Hopefully, given the work we have been putting into advising, we are improving. That is the goal in the College of Arts and Sciences,” he said.
Snyder says that the University has several plans for combating this problem.
“First, the College of Arts and Sciences instituted advisor training sessions last year. We have not conducted them yet this year because we are waiting for a new system that is being implemented by the Registrar,” said Snyder.
“Second, through our Sophomore Symposium, which we inaugurated this year, we are helping students understand that advising is as much their responsibility as it is the responsibility of their advisors.
“Third, the Student Senate has offered to pitch in and offer peer advising. I applaud this effort, and we will continue to support it in the future,” he said.
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