On Advising

With more information on the planned Vermont State University’s new team-based advising model being published this week, this issue of The Educator considers some of the broader context for discussions of advising.

You can learn more about the new VTSU model by visiting this list of Frequently Asked Questions, with additional information about asking questions and upcoming meetings to discuss it.

The model draws on the best of the practices that have been adopted on all of the future VTSU campuses. For some of Castleton’s contributions to the thinking, you may be interested to review the recommendations of the Castleton Advising Task Force that met in 2019-21. These recommendations for a team-based model that would be developmental, holistic, and agile were endorsed by Castleton’s Faculty Assembly in May 2021.

This model builds on the outstanding advising that students have come to expect from Castleton faculty. You can read more about this kind of advising with a brief story on the Academic and Professional Advising of Professor Peg Richards and Professor Marybeth Lennox-Levins.

Castleton’s Student Success Coaches have contributed some of the example for the new Student Success Advisors. Last term, the coaches worked with Connections Seminar 1 faculty to support students throughout the fall semester. In this post on Success Coaches, Trust and Belonging, you can learn more about the collaboration of Professor Margaret Miles and Success Coach Ashley Haggerty.

The VTSU model has established the basis for the “team-based” approach, but now the work begins to invite and integrate the support of others onto the team. The role of Connections Seminar 1 faculty is still being hammered out. As is the new Career Development model for VTSU. For a preview, consider the the excellent work of the Castleton team. This inaugural podcast of The Power of Internships features VTSU Director of Career Development and Innovation Jessica Duncan, Assistant Director of Applied Learning for Career Development Renee Beaupre-White, and PT Faculty member Lisa Donohue.

Finally, if you want to take a deeper dive into some of the thinking behind the model, you may be interested to read this report on Strategies for Improving Student Retention from Hanover Research.

By Chris Boettcher

Chris Boettcher, is the inaugural Director of the Castleton Center for Teaching and Learning and Professor of English.

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