Graduation Oriented Advising

WHAT: • An approach to advising that focuses on

identifying, planning for, and achieving a graduation target

• Student Ownership• Connects to– Degree Maps / Milestones– Prospect for Success

Graduation Oriented Advising

WHY:• For students: Estimated cost of attendance @

UNC Charlotte is $10,000 (plus lost earnings)• For us: – Meeting graduation targets (4-yr, 6yr, and 4-yr

Transfer)– More efficient use of course availability

Graduation Oriented Advising

PROCESS• Select target population• Identify students you want to reach (place

advising holds if desired)• Prepare GOA communication and worksheets• Inform students of GOA process and their

responsibilities• GOA advising

GOA -- OPTIONS

Target Population

• 4th Semester (Entered as Freshmen, Fall 2012)• 6th Semester (Entered as Freshmen, Fall 2011)

(IR and UCOL can help generate and process the data)

Advising Holds?

• Balancing potential impact vs workload and potential logjams

• GOA ‘Waiver’ is an option

Materials • Adapt current advising materials• Develop new advising materials

GOA Process • What’s expected of students• Changes to advising (eg. small group advising)

Graduation Oriented Advising

Examples• History• Chemistry

Criminal Justice and Criminology Department

571 Majors402 Pre-CJ Majors120 Minors1093 fantastic students!

Our Advising Team• Susan Hodge, Lecturer and Advising

Coordinator

• Kathleen Nicolaides, Senior Lecturer, Academic and Pre-Law Advisor

• Joe Marinello, Lecturer and Advisor

(We all leap buildings in a single bound.)

Graduation-Oriented Advising

• OH NO!!! MORE WORK!!!!

Are there additional advantages to the Graduation Oriented Advising?

• The earlier students connect and become engaged in their department, the better it is for both the students and the department.

• Students become familiar with the advisors, what the department has to offer, and…. Wait for it… THE CURRICULUM!!!

Now, on to the issues

• TOO MANY STUDENTS!!• We place holds on our majors and pre-majors at 85-

100 hours and any students in academic trouble.• They must come in for advising before registering

for the upcoming semester. • At least 150 students come in during this period to

see the 3 of us. (Granted we are super…. But not super human)

• So we are adding how many students???

So how do we handle MORE students that we require to come in???

• Group Meetings?

Next issue:

• Flexible curriculum.• Therefore it is hard to help a student plan out

what courses to take in a particular order.

Our Requirements

• Intro to Criminal Justice is the pre-requisite for all 3000 level courses.

• Intro to Criminal Justice and Statistics (grades of C or better) and a Writing component must all be completed before the major can be declared.

• Students must have 60 hours to register for any 3000 level courses.

However…

• Problem: Once they reach 60 hours, they can take any elective in any order.

• Also different electives are offered different semesters, so you cannot predict which classes will be taught when.

How to solve this issue:

• Advise students regarding the importance of taking Intro to CJ and Statistics as soon as possible so they can declare the major and continue on.

• Also recommend that they begin their foreign language sequence EARLY (CJ requires 3 semesters of latin alphabet based language or 2 semesters of non-latin alphabet based language)

• And- encourage students to begin taking classes in a minor.

Conclusion

• Our advising team sees the benefits of the Graduation Oriented Advising.

• However, we would need to adapt the procedures to make it work for our department.

• What issues do you see with this process for your department and how can you overcome them?