Academic advising worksheet

Questions to ask and things to check or consider when advising a student

1.   Confirm major, minor, and concentration—Please ask the student to tell you his or her major/concentration area and minor.  Many times students have changed majors or think they have, and in fact, they have not. 

2.   Look at GPA—if student’s gpa is below 2.0 or near the lower end of the 2.0 scale, do not allow him or her to register for more than 12 hours if not working.  If working more than 20 hours per week, unless there is a compelling reason why the student must take 12 hours, encourage the student to take fewer hours.

3.   Ask the student if s/he works, and if so, how many hours and where.  If a student works more than twenty hours weekly, then s/he should probably not take more than 9 hours.  Under 20, then 12 hours are ok if the GPA is strong. 

4.   More hours do not equal a higher GPA. Encourage students to take fewer hours and to earn better grades in them.  You might want to remind them that for every F they have, they need to earn an A to get to a C average.  For every D, they need to earn a B.  Sometimes pointing out that they will need to earn X amt of A’s to raise the GPA makes them understand this better.  Especially if they have never earned a single A in anything.

5.   Intervene early.  If a student’s GPA is low in the freshman/sophomore year, stop him or her from enrolling in too many hours, especially if the student works full or part time.  Make sure that students do not overload themselves.  Use the tracking screen to place restrictions on load, etc.

6.   Ask if student has family obligations that might interfere with studying and completing projects.

7.   Ask if student is receiving financial aid or other assistance, and if so, please make yourself familiar with these requirements so that students enroll in the appropriate amount of courses.

8.   Ask the student if s/he is a morning person/night person, and do not encourage a night owl to enroll in an 8:00 class.  The reality is that the student may well not attend it.

9.   Periodic check-ins are important—advising is more than merely registering students in classes.

10. Substitutions need to be made at the time of advising. Please do not wait until the semester of graduation to put in the subs.  The student must be registered for the course or have completed the course in order to make the sub.

11.  Confirm catalog year when examining degree audits (screen 681).

12.  Rule of thumb—for every course in which a student is enrolled, s/he needs to plan to study three hours for every one hour of class time.  If a student is enrolled in 12 hours, that is 36 hours of study time.  There are only 168 hours in a week.  This is a good number to have handy, as students do not often understand that there are only this many hours in a week.  168-48 (class time)=128-42 (sleep 6 hrs a night)=86-20 (work)=66-14 (2 hours per day prep for work/school, travel to work school)=52 hours remain for eating dinner, relaxing, etc.  That is fewer than 7.4 hours per day to unwind, get extra sleep, do housework, etc. If students work 40 hours per week, that equation changes considerably.

13.  Do not advise suspended students unless they come to you with a suspension re-admission contract; please be sure to review the tracking screen.