The American College Personnel Association's "Student Learning Imperative" is a statement of principles for college personnel working outside the classroom that is designed to focus on the core mission of undergraduate education student learning and personal development. Current use of this statement around the country is reviewed, and…

Root concepts and critical thinking skills are offered as the solution to the disparate interests and concerns of academic affairs and student affairs professionals. A variety of advising strategies is provided to assist advisees in learning how to make well-informed decisions about their future. (Author/MLW)

A study to "arrive at a clearer understanding of the type of relationship students want when interacting with a faculty advisor" is described. The results indicate that most students think it is important for their advisor to be personally acquainted with them. (Author/MLW)

A large midwestern university's advising program for high-risk athletes using a student development approach is described. Athletes' views on the people and events in their environment affecting academic performance and recommendations for their advisors are also outlined. (MSE)

Four advising styles, authoritative, authoritarian, permissive, and uninvolved, were identified according to doctoral students' perceptions of demandingness and responsiveness of their advisors. Doctoral students who perceive working with authoritative advisors reported the highest levels of perceived development in cognition, motivation,…

The Family and Child Development Advising Center at Kansas State University, created to centralize all advising functions into one operation, seeks also to explore the more personal aspects of the student's academic program and vocational decisions. A questionnaire survey of student perceptions of the centralized advising center is discussed. (MLW)

The quality of the student-faculty interaction in academic advising is a major contributing variable to institutional holding power. Students were surveyed for the type of relationship that was most productive, qualitative and satisfying for them. The student development theory in advising was explored. (MLW)

Data collected during new-student orientation on nontraditional-age and traditional-age first-time students indicated more psychosocial similarities than differences between them. Results suggest that first-entry nontraditional students experience some of the same needs and concerns in higher education as do their younger peers. Referrals to…

Strengths-based advising is proposed as a new lens for higher education, one that enables advisors to see diverse groups of students fulfill their potential and achieve excellence. Based on research from social work, positive psychology, and the business world, this approach enables advisors to identify and build on the inherent talents students…

Since the mid-1990s, social norms theory has become prevalent in student development literature and research. Subsequently, social norms interventions to change student behavior have spread across campuses nationwide through marketing campaigns. Theorists and practitioners have applied the social norms approach to primarily health-related student…

Eight challenges for the future of academic advising are discussed: the development of research to provide evidence that quality advising assists in producing positive outcomes; to arouse campus decision-makers to action, to defend the value of advising during decline and retrenchment, to elevate the status of advising, etc. (MLW)

Ten popular myths about higher education's effect on students are questioned. Issues include: test scores in assessment of college impact; college effect on student development; institutional resources/prestige and quality; two-year college attendance; educational quality at historically black colleges; teaching methods; faculty research; teaching…