Chapter 4: Faculty
Academic Advisement


All degree-seeking students are assigned an academic advisor. Most advisors are faculty members, but some students who have not yet declared a major are assigned non-faculty advisors until they do so. Advisee loads vary dramatically by department, depending on the popularity of the degree programs. Faculty in some departments have forty or fifty advisees, while faculty in others may have only a handful.

Except for new faculty who participate in orientation and those who work with undeclared students, no University-wide training in advisement is provided. The new Degree Audit Records System (DARS) (see Chapter 3) has been a great help in providing accurate, timely curricular information to advisors and advisees. An advisor handbook and newsletter published by the Academic Advisement office (see Chapter 6) update faculty on issues and changes affecting advising.

Students may not be as satisfied with academic advisement as with most other aspects of life at Millersville. In a 1996 State System survey of 400 Millersville undergraduates, only 30% felt that our effectiveness in "providing an academic advisor who is interested in your progress" was better than expected, compared to 38% of undergraduates at other State System universities. These findings were corroborated by a Spring 1998 survey of Millersville sophomores conducted by the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA, in which 32% of respondents felt that our effectiveness in this regard was worse than expected.

These findings appear to be contradicted, however, by two other questions on the System survey. Roughly three-quarters of respondents agreed at least somewhat that "My academic advisor is interested in my progress, and tries to help me" and "My advisor is usually available when I need to speak to them."

Focus groups of 68 faculty sponsored by the Center for Academic Excellence in 1999 agreed that students seem less than satisfied with the advisement they receive. The faculty speculated that students equate advisement with registration only and do not take advantage of faculty expertise and willingness to advise except during registration.