1. Introduction

A. GENESIS OF THE REPORT

Each College representative to the University Academic Advising Center is obligated to promote and improve student advising in her/his College. This report represents the attempt by the current SSIS representative to meet that obligation for this academic year. Additionally, it is a continuation of an effort undertaken in 1999-2000 by the Academic Council of the College of SSIS to understand and to strengthen advising practice in the College. It has been prepared as a report to the Academic Council by the current Center representative who has served the first of his four-semester tenure in the Center and has 12 years of experience advising students as Chair of the Economics Department.

B. THE STUDENT ADVISING DILEMMA AT CSUS

 It is widely agreed that nearly all CSUS students would benefit from timely academic, career, and other in-person advising from University faculty. It is, however, widely understood that it is extremely difficult to convince most students of the value of advising and to get them to seek it or to accept it when offered (or even when required). The dilemma is clear: in-person faculty advising is good, but for a majority of students, not feasible to deliver. The dilemma is essentially insoluble and a second-best situation must be sought in the matter.

C. COMMENTS ON THE FALL, 1999, SURVEY OF ADVISING IN THE COLLEGE

(Survey results are found in attachment A.)

1. A large majority of the thirteen departments and programs surveyed believe the success of their advising programs is good or very good. This appears to be at odds with evidence that a relatively small minority of students in the College (or University) receive department- or program-based advising. The contradiction may be explained by departments and programs having their own understandings of what constitutes success in academic advising. It may be explained, in part, by the presence of several small programs in the College in which the low number of students allows for greater contact between students and the programs' directors and faculty.

2. The widespread availability in departments and programs of printed information on advising is encouraging, though the indication from answers in the survey is that success in getting the information to students is not high.

3. A sizeable majority of responses were in favor of mandatory advising, though only six responded that advising was even required in their programs, let alone mandatory

4. Although a majority responded that GE advising in departments and programs is satisfactory, there was considerable opposition to undertaking the complexities of that advising task. In addition, the majority belief that GE advising is satisfactory, appears to be at odds with the recognized lack of understanding by most faculty and many department chairs of many aspects of the GE Program. The responses are no doubt based, not on an ideal GE advising standard, but department and program perceptions of what good GE advising is at their levels.