 |
|
|
| 
|
 “We are currently looking into how to introduce a new, Web-based advising module at Grove City College. Our vendor is Jenzabar (formerly CMDS). The advising module has great possibilities, however the graduation audit piece is not yet working the way that we want it.Coupled with advising is how to introduce online registration. We want to protect the adviser-advisee system, yet how do we properly audit? (Currently a registration form needs signed by an adviser.) Therefore, we have established committees to look at the following: 1. The 'Human-side' of advising (Review current practices and adviser-advisee communication and relationships) 2. 'E-Advising:' (Look at the functions that are offered for usability.) 3. Administrative support roles. (What role does the registrar and student affairs office offer? Should we have a more formal Advising department?)” ~ Fred Lang, Grove City College, January 15 “Technology has not yet affected academic advising at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville to the extent that it has at many other institutions. For example, advisers here still register students in a real-time on-line system during the advising appointment. Advising here is mandatory and students can only get registered by seeing an adviser. E-mail is of course becoming more of a factor, but we do not formally do e-mail advising. We have just begun using document imaging on a limited basis. And we possess a Web registration module, but it is not yet installed. Also, I have been encoding and maintaining On Course, our degree audit, for over eight years, but for various reasons it has not yet been implemented. We are apparently close to much greater use of technology, but right now I have to say that the effects are minimal.”~ William G. Hendey, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, January 16 “We currently use several methods to register students for classes. They can access our mainframe via TN3270, a telephone interface, or via a Web component. Each of these allows students to self register.
We have seen E-mail advising become popular, but it is not supported at this time. We have been planning a Web based 'virtual adviser' system that will answer many of the problems inherent with E-mail advising.Additionally, we have recognized the great wealth of knowledge available in our advisers and have started working on a project that will record advising-related questions and answers that will be added to an advising knowledge base for searching and archiving. We have had conversations regarding how technologies such as video conferencing and digital document repositories could impact advising. These are items that will probably be our focus as we implement our other initiatives mentioned above. We are dealing with how to balance technology without sacrificing the face-to-face contact that is so important. As well, buy in by advisers is key. Without their support, any project will fail.” ~ Nathan Byrer, Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis, January 17 (SIUE, Part II) “It seems to me that advisers have anticipated the increasing impact or 'encroachment,' if you will, of technology. There has been for some time a trend toward more proactive advising techniques. Over the past several years advisers have become increasingly involved in offering workshops to students, especially to students in academic difficulty, and in teaching various academic survival/success and orientation kinds of courses. Advisers have also involved themselves in 'outreach' activities. Advisers more and more do not wait for students to initiate contact; they contact their advisees through various methods: phone, e-mail, regular mail, etc. This is certainly true at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, though we are clearly not at the forefront technologically. Of course this could be just a serendipitous development. It could be that academic advising has over time matured into bona fide profession and has now defined a clear role in higher education. It could also be that the student population has changed very significantly during the past thirty years and that the needs of the current student group have dictated a different approach to advising. Actually, I believe that these two phenomena converged and resulted in both a heightened commitment to and a more pressing need for increased personal interaction with students. Interestingly, this trend occurred at the very time that technology made it possible.”~ William G. Hendey, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, January 18 The Mentor is published by Penn State's Division of Undergraduate Studies Available online at www.psu.edu/dus/mentor/ Privacy and Legal Statements | Copyright | © The Pennsylvania State University | All rights reserved | |
