WHY AREN’T YOU TAKING YOUR PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT MORE SERIOUSLY? As an academic advisor I want to yell this at students on an almost daily basis. As a new advisor, this is the type of question that quickly discouraged me. Coming from a mental health background I knew how to encourage positive growth in my clients but as a new advisor I floundered. My personal road to crafting my advising persona has not been a long one, but it has been fraught with obstacles that I created for myself and my students. The major insight that helped me develop into the type of advisor I hope will impact students’ lives is incredibly simple: Students aren’t clients. I know this seems obvious, but it took me months to figure this one out.
First, my clients were motivated to change. There was something in their lives that they couldn’t live with any more; they knew what it was so they made the effort to find me. Yet many students are in college because that is what was expected of them when they graduated high-school. Some students enter college with little internal drive to excel, probably because many of them have only a faint idea of what they wanted to do “when they grow up”. Truthfully, that is not the student’s fault. Students’ main purpose in high-school is developing social relationships and establishing their sense of themselves: who they are, what they are good at, what they are interested in, etc. In high-school “the future” is a long time away and parents/teachers/administrators who should be talking to students about it simply don’t. How, I ask, are students supposed to make the decisions that will direct them to where they need to be professionally when many of them haven’t identified where they want to be? The first thing I do when I look up directions on GoogleMaps or Mapquest is identify a destination. Then I evaluate the pros and cons of different routes and select the one that meets the majority of my needs. Without a goal, students have no context for making good decisions about course scheduling, finding valuable internships, identifying the most beneficial part-time job experiences, evaluating the quality of academic enrichment programs, the value of studying and getting good grades… the list goes on and on. As a result, when students do find their way in to my office, the student’s goals may be worlds apart from mine. Almost every student wants to discuss scheduling- and nothing else.
Second, my clients were overwhelmingly adult. As a new advisor, it took me a very long time to stumble upon this (also obvious) gem; it was tricky because my students look like adults. However, many students have never had to make decisions with such high-stakes before and therefore lack the appropriate tools to do so. In the beginning, I was frustrated with students who didn’t know where to look for information, who asked (what I believed were) obvious questions, and/or who didn’t take personal responsibility for their own academic or professional development. Then I realized: my students just left high-school. They are experiencing a major life shift and my job is not to set adult expectations for them, it is to help them transition to adulthood so that they can meet the adult expectations that their employers or graduate programs will set for them. This helped me realize the error of my ways.
Third, my students are awesome. Once I had my first and second insights, this one was hot on their heels. This is not to imply that my clients were not an amazing group of people. This is to celebrate the fact that my students have their whole lives before them, the boundless energy and enthusiasm of youth, and the brains to put them to good use with a little guidance when necessary. That combination is awesome. When my advising comes from the same place that my counseling does, my students flourish. In counseling my respect for my clients fostered a partnership attitude that helped move my clients from burdened to bountiful. In advising when I stopped feeling disappointed in my students for not already behaving like responsible professionals and started partnering with them to discuss the multitude of opportunities before them, they became more engaged in exploring and planning their own career trajectories… and that makes me happy.
Finally, I was just like them. This one pains me to admit. I am chagrined when I remember that once-upon-a-time I went to graduate school interviews without having investigated what the faculty members at that school were researching and figuring out if I was a good fit for their program. I once went to a job interview without Googling the address- I ended up going to the wrong location and was late to the interview. I once missed an interview because I didn’t write the down the suite number. I have no idea how I figured out what I needed to do to graduate from my undergraduate program because I can only recall seeing my advisor a half dozen times. I made it out. I am a responsible adult. Now I want to use my experience to save my students some of the growing pains I experienced. It is my hope that the information contained in this site will help my students flourish.