Academic advising

By Demetrios Nicolaides

Do you know what academic advising is? Do you know who academic advisors are and what they do? If not, don’t worry, because now is your chance to help resolve the situation. The university’s Academic Advising Coordinating Committee has commissioned a small sub-committee to develop principles on academic advising and outline the roles and responsibilities of both your advisors and of the students. It is at this stage where we need your help.


To ensure that the principles we develop and the responsibilities we outline are in line with what students want, a small questionnaire has been created to give you a chance to give your input into this process.


We would appreciate it if you took a few minutes to fill out this short questionnaire and send your responses to jleduc@ucalgary.ca to assist us with our work. Responses should be submitted by March 15, 2004.


1. Where would you go, or who would you talk to, to find out which courses you need to take to get your degree?


2. Who would you talk to about other academic matters, like how to go about getting into a program or what a program you are thinking of taking is really like?


3. What do you expect an academic advisor to know?


4. Do you think of your professors as academic advisors?  What about your department head or program director?


5. Who is the most helpful person/office you’ve ever spoken to about your program?


6. Do you know where the program advisors for your faculty are located?


7. If you could give other students one piece of advice about their academic program, what would it be?


8. What’s the number one thing you would do to improve academic advising on campus?


9. On a scale of 1-10, how im- portant do you think academic advising is in helping you get your degree (with one being completely unimportant)?


10. Other comments?


You can also fill out this survey electronically on the SU’s website, www.su.ucalgary.ca.