Committee Members From This Past Year

• Mike Stoll (Chair)
• Julie Amon-Mattox
• Brian Trager
• Shanon Zakalik

Vacancies for F23/W24

Two member positions 

CSAL Student Representative

During the past year, how did the committee work positively impact your advising skills?

Having served on the committee from 2020-2023, I have become very focused on the outcomes of each advising appointment in terms of reviewing requirements and documenting referrals. It has given me more of an assessment mindset in terms of our whole office as well and how to best be able to quantify our work.

We onboarded two new advisors in Winter 2023 and because we were working on a standardized new advisor training topic list, I was more aware and intentional about covering topics that other centers were also focusing on with their training. Due to that, I feel that our training calendar and process was successful and therefore, validated the need for a centralized document that is now stored on the LAAN website.

What accomplishments did your committee achieve during this past academic year? Projects and initiatives worked on?

In the Fall 2022 and Winter 2023 semester, our committee worked to finalize the proposed standardized job descriptions for the positions of Academic Advisor, Senior Academic Advisor, and Assistant Director. In May 2023, we met with an HR representative to work through proposed changes from HR and we sent the final draft to Suzeanne Bennet and Bonnie Bowen for consideration. The final step of this process will include guidance and a recommendation from Suzeanne and Bonnie as it relates to standardizing job responsibilities and promotion.

During this academic year, our committee created a standardized Advisor Training Topics for the purpose of training new advising staff. We took a detailed look at several advising center's recent training plans and created a list of common training topics that can be utilized throughout the onboarding of advisors.

Throughout the 2022-2023 academic year, we wrestled with our current Student Learning Outcomes (SLOs) that were developed during the 2021-2022 academic year. Even though formal assessment was still on pause at the university, we took a look at some of the data and recognized that some modifications were necessary. This work will continue over the summer with the hopes of revising the after appointment summary in order to be ready for the Fall 2023 semester and 2023-2024 assessment cycle. Our committee also revisited the post-appointment survey sent to students and on the whole, we consider that to still be an effective method of evaluation, but have minor edits to suggest to the UAALC.

What work will you carry over that was unfinished to the next academic year?

As the university ramps up for a return to formal assessment, we look to revise the Navigate post-appointment summary questions in order to more accurately reflect the work being done and better capture data. This includes the following:

• If a referral(s) was made, where was the student referred?
• Did you review myPath and/or graduation requirements?
• Did you create or update an academic plan?

We also hope to send out a standard way of reporting referrals as a drop-down box is not available. This will lead to better reporting data. 

The committee will also look to review the post-appointment survey being sent out via Qualtrics after appointments and have it reviewed by the UAALC. 

What benefits would advisors gain by joining your committee for F23/W24?

Members of our committee will benefit by connecting with other advisors outside of their center, and participating in shared work to make advising more streamlined and standardized in its processes. Joining this committee is an effective way to make a positive impact in our advising community and create change for the good of advisors and ultimately the students we serve.