Advising and Mentoring First-Year Students
The following discussion includes topics that are particularly relevant to first-year student advising but apply to the sophomore year as well.
Advising Portal
Faculty advisors obtain access to records for each of their advisees through the Advising
Portal. The portal contains up-to-date information on the student’s degree audit,
schedule, cumulative record, placement information, and admissions essays (see page
7) of this guide.
The “Advising Notes” and “Admissions” tabs will be of special interest to advisors
of first-year students.
Advising Notes Tab
Summer Advising Notes. OAA staff and Summer Advisors have already added notes describing interactions with your advisees. These notes often contain information about the rationale underlying your students’ fall-semester schedules. You may also find helpful information on each student’s preparation, cocurricular interests, and longer-term goals. If the student is a Filene, Porter, or S3M Scholar, a note identifying the academic requirements of the scholarship is included for your information.
Academic Attention Letter. If a student’s senior year has been below par, you will be copied on an “Academic Attention” letter from the Dean of Admissions to the student. A corresponding note will appear in the Advising Portal. Staff in the OAA will meet with any student so identified. As the advisor, consider anyone flagged in this manner to be “at risk,” and please consult with OAA staff if you observe worrisome behavior or academic problems occurring.
Admissions and RAP Tabs
Placement Information. Your advisee’s testing information has been translated into Expository Writing (EW)
and Quantitative Reasoning (QR) placement. FLL placements are also provided if testing
information is available. Please refer to pages 14–19 in the New Student Advising and Registration Guide for information and recommendations regarding course selection for the EW, QR, and
foreign language requirements.
Long and Short Essay. These essays often provide interesting insight into your students’ educational background
and goals. In some cases, a scanned copy of the student’s entire Common Application
is provided through the “Long Essay” link. Beginning in Fall 2014, all students have
a link to the entire Common Application through the “View Admissions Application”
link.
RAP Essay. The summer “Reflection and Projection” (RAP) enables the first-year student to begin
the process of formulating academic and cocurricular goals. We encourage faculty advisors
to read the RAP carefully and to use it as a basis for their first conversation with
the student during Orientation. Please ask students who have not done their RAP to
do so before their next advising appointment.
Time Management
First-year students confront a 24-hour day that is no longer prescribed by high school
classes, after-school activities, a part-time job, or parental demands. For some,
this “clean slate” is liberating, and they have little trouble adjusting. Others struggle
to organize and balance their commitment to studying, socializing, eating, and sleeping.
Often, one or more of these four activities gets short shrift during the first year
of college. Time management is an important issue to raise in your initial conversation
with your advisee and again in subsequent weeks. Ongoing assistance with this topic
is available throughout the year in the office of Student Academic Services.
Encourage your advisee to buy an appointment book or use an electronic calendar and
to spend a few minutes every evening plotting out the next day’s activities, including
blocks of daytime hours to study (high school students often think of “homework” as an evening-only
activity). Suggest that your advisee put all of his or her syllabi information on
the calendar, including dates that readings and assignments are due, midterm exams,
and final exams. If you find at a subsequent meeting that your advisee needs more
help with time management, encourage him or her to keep a log of every activity in
half-hour intervals throughout the day and night. The advisee should persist with
the logging activity for a full week. A review of how and where time is spent should
help determine where the problems lie. If neither the appointment book/calendar system
nor the log seem to be helping, send your advisee to Student Academic Services for
more intensive assistance.
Encouraging Involvement Outside the Classroom
We hope you will consider the importance of your advisees’ personal as well as intellectual development. Encourage them to become involved, even minimally, in some cocurricular activity such as joining a musical group or the student government, volunteering in the local community, peer tutoring, trying out for a theater production, or playing intramural sports. Such engagement could make the difference between a student’s feeling like a member of the Skidmore community and feeling disaffected. Fourth-credit hour programming coordinated by the First-Year Experience is a resource for helping first-year students make connections outside the classroom.
Keeping Abreast of Graduation Requirements
Requirements that must be completed by the end of the first year include the Scribner Seminar, Expository Writing if placement is EN 103, and QR1 (by passing the QR Exam during the first year or by completing MA 100 by end of the sophomore year).
While it is ultimately the student’s responsibility to complete all requirements in a timely fashion, the faculty advisor should aid this process by providing reminders and reviewing the degree audit with the student on a regular basis.
IMPORTANT: Students should complete their foundation requirements in EW and QR in a timely manner. Students who do not complete EW by the end of the sophomore year and QR by the junior year will be reviewed by the Committee on Academic Standing for not fulfilling the College’s minimum standards for continuation. Desire to study abroad does not trump fulfillment of these requirements; students should plan to complete both EW and QR by the end of the sophomore year if they wish to study abroad their entire junior year.