1. Monday, March 5, 2018 Marriott Downtown, Salon J
This Isn’t Working: One Institution’s Revisioning of Exploratory Advising
Heather Searcy, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro Dana Saunders, The University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Monday, March 5, Marriott Downtown, Salon J

2. Who’s in the room?
By a show of hands how many folks in the room work for a public institution? For a private institution?
How many work in Enrollment Management? Academic Affairs? Student Affairs? Other units?
Finally- how many work in academic advising? Work with Exploratory students in some capacity?

3. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Public, coeducational, doctoral-granting residential university
20,000 students (13,000 undergraduates)
Over 100 undergraduate programs
Student to faculty ratio is 20:1, average class size is 25
Undergraduate student body:
Fall 2017 first-year cohort = 2,790 students
43% ethnic minorities
retention rate = 77.31%
Decentralized academic advising model
Celebrating our 125th anniversary!
Most diverse in the UNC system
Mention establishment of EM division and adoption of predictive modeling as part of substantive administrative change at UNCG

4. The Students First Office
Established in Fall 2011 as UNCG’s academic one-stop-shop
Academic Advising
Academic Recovery
Starfish EARLY ALERT
Provides supplemental advising for any undergraduate student
Serves as the centralized academic advising center for Exploratory majors since Fall 2012
Total # of Fall 2017 Exploratory majors = 553
Fall 2017 Exploratory first-year cohort = 350
Generalists for academic majors; Experts in academic policy
: 3,347 unique students; 6,118 total student visits

5. Today’s Agenda The Historical Context for Undecided Students at UNCG
The Call for Institutional Change
SFO’s Exploratory Advising Model
Outcomes and Success Metrics
Challenges and Opportunities for Continued Development
Questions

6. Exploratory Majors - A Historical Perspective
Advising Model From :
Assigned a faculty advisor in the College of Arts & Sciences
Received advising identical to declared majors
Designated as “Undecided” students
Retention SWOT Team’s Findings - “By the Numbers”
Identified as the group having the highest risk of attrition at UNCG
Average Cohort Size = 223
Average retention = 74.1% (University average = 76%)
Average Cumulative GPA = 2.45
% who declared a major by 30 hours = 45.8%
Not trained in student development theory; not professional advisors
EXP students divided among 5 faculty advisors as part of a larger advising load of declared students in their unit

7. “This isn’t working!”

8. Exploratory Advising Organization/ Infrastructure
Programmatic Support
Advising Models/ Theoretical Foundations

9. Goals of the *New* Exploratory Advising Model
Drastically expand contact time students have with their assigned academic advisors
Intentionally guide and support students to find academic majors that are the best fit based on students’ personal, academic, and career goals
Actively promote an “advising as teaching” approach to academic advising through both developmental and appreciative advising practices

10. SFO’s Exploratory Advising Model2
GPA
Projection
Reinforce
Campus Resources
Registration
Advising
Check Goal Progress
Review Major Interests
Schedule Development 1
Relationship Development
Explore Interests, Strengths, & Skills
Exploratory Planning
Review Exploratory Advising Syllabus
Teach Three Advising Tools
Develop Plan for Exploration

11. Starfish EARLY ALERT Implemented university-wide in 2012
Allows instructors to raise flags and kudos to alert students and their “support network” of academic progress/challenges
Coordinated outreach from Exploratory advisors to advisees throughout semester

12. Exploratory FFL 100: Exploring Self, World, and Future
Partner with our New Student Transitions and First Year Experience office to coordinate Exploratory-specific first year transition course
Taught by Exploratory advisors or campus partners with a special interest in working with Exploratory students
Common components across all EXP FFL sections

13. Advisor/Instructor Partnership Model
Advisors

14. Common Components of Syllabi
Exploratory Planning meeting
Strengths Finder assessment and correlating presentation by Career Coach
Informational interview assignment
Liberal Arts Advantage Video Series
Personal Success Plan

15. UNCG Explorers Living Learning Community
Students elect to live in Explorers community
Located in on of UNCG’s largest first-year residence halls
Students are assigned rooms on the same floor
All students in the community are Exploratory majors and are enrolled in the same section of FFL 100, taught by the Coordinator for Residence Life of the building
All students in the Explorers community are assigned to the same academic advisor
Schedules advising hours in residence hall during peak advising times
Same involvement in FFL class that I mentioned on the previous slide - periodically joins students in the classroom
Challenges: enrollment in community, participation outside of the FFL classroom, responsible use of resources for size of community, little Housing and Residence Life staff support beyond CRL

16. Career Services Center Collaborations (Past and Present)
Exploratory Road Trip
The Liberal Arts Advantage Video Series
Map It! Major and Career Maps
UNCG’s Major/Minor Fair
Explore It! Job Shadowing Program

17. Outcomes Exploratory Metric (Average) 2004-2011 2012-Present
First-Year Cohort Size
223
Retention Rate
(76.00)
Cumulative GPA
2.45
Major Declaration Rate (30 hours)
45.80%
Major Declaration Rate (60 hours)
*Not Tracked*
291
80.10 (77.15)
2.91
53.45%
71.71%

18. Challenges and Opportunities Moving Forward
Advising Model
Participation in Exploratory Planning meeting following first semester
Development of and recruitment for Exploratory programming
Refinement of the curriculum in Exploratory sections of FFL 100
Exploratory Student Profile
Enrollment growth of Exploratory major first-year cohort
Increasing number of first-year students with college credit
Changes to University policy requiring major declaration
Growing population of “transient” majors from other academic units
Exploratory Planning participation declines in spring semesters : 49.8% of our EXP advisees came in for Exploratory Planning compared to 34.9% in spring
We will be the first to admit that we are not a programming office - so our partnerships across campus are critical to our programming efforts
Student participation is often low...which is why our programming has changed so much over the years

19. Questions???

20. References
Bloom, J.L., Hutson, B.L., & He, Ye. (2008). The Appreciative Advising Revolution. Stipes Publishing.
Darling, R.A., & Woodside, M. (2007). The academic advisor as teaching: First-year tranisitons. In M.S. Hunter, B. McCalla-Wriggins, & E.R. White (Eds.), Academic advising: New insights for teaching and learning in the first year. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina.
Hagen, P.L., & Jordan, P. (2008). Theoretical foundations of academic advising. In In V.N. Gordon, W.R. Habley, and T.J. Grites’ (Eds.), Academic Advising: A Comprehensive Handbook (2nd edition). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
Hunter, M.S., Henscheid, J., and Mouton, M. (2007). Collaborations beyond the advising office. In M.S. Hunter, B. McCalla-Wriggins, & E.R. White (Eds.), Academic advising: New insights for teaching and learning in the first year. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina.
King, M.C. (2008). Organization of academic advising services. In V.N. Gordon, W.R. Habley, and T.J. Grites’ (Eds.), Academic Advising: A Comprehensive Handbook (2nd edition). San Francisco: Jossey Bass.
McDonald, M., & Steele, G.E. (2007). Adapting learning theory to advising first-year undecided students. . In M.S. Hunter, B. McCalla-Wriggins, & E.R. White (Eds.), Academic advising: New insights for teaching and learning in the first year. Columbia, SC: University of South Carolina.
Nealy, M. (2005). Key to student retention—strong advising. Diverse: Issues in Higher Education, 22(14), 12.
O’Banion, T. (1994). An academic advising model. NACADA Journal, 14(2), pp
The University of North Carolina at Greensboro (2009). Undergraduate Studies Retention SWOT Team, Fall 2009 committee report. Greensboro, NC.

21. Heather Searcy Dana Saunders hakern2@uncg.edu dfsaunde@uncg.edu

22. Thank you for joining us today!
Please remember to complete your online evaluation following the conference.
See you in Los Angeles in 2019!