1.1 Academic and Faculty Advisors
Faculty advising is central to the delivery of services to students. The MGH Institute believes that effective advising involves both proactive and developmental components.
Proactive advising assists in building relationships with students by anticipating their needs and connecting them to appropriate resources and support early in their academic careers.
Developmental advising recognizes that the advisor and the student are partners in educational discovery and share responsibility for the advising relationship and the quality of the experience. It focuses on capacity for growth and involves facilitating the student’s environmental, and interpersonal interactions, behavioral awareness, problem solving, decision-making, and evaluation skills.
Within the CSD MS program, a Director of Student Success and Curriculum oversees advising, collaborating with the Department Chair, Program Director, Clinical Director and department faculty. Advising follows three pillars:
· Navigate: Providing academic advising to help students understand the curriculum, select electives, and make informed decisions at critical junctures, such as pursuing a thesis or concentration.
· Connect: Fostering connections among students, faculty, and resources to build a supportive and connected community.
· Thrive: Helping students develop and discover areas of interest, providing professional development opportunities and connecting students with resources to help them thrive in their path towards becoming Speech-Language Pathologists.
Each enrolled student works with Academic Advisors and a Faculty Connect Advisor.
Academic Advisors: The Program Director and a Senior Faculty member are the core academic advisors who help students navigate the program. Academic advisors provide regularly-scheduled academic advising to all students each semester. The primary purpose of academic advising meetings is to assist with registration and course selection and progression towards graduation.
Faculty Connect Advisors: Students are assigned a faculty connect advisor who serves as an additional resource and faculty advisor throughout a student’s program of study. Faculty Connect Advisors support pillars of navigate, connect and thrive through small group, individualized meetings with students, and regularly-scheduled check-ins. Faculty Connect Advisors help ensure that students are aware of the resources available to them at the IHP and support referrals related to academic and professional development.
In addition to mandatory meetings held with Academic advisors and faculty connect advisors, students are invited to participate in optional meetings and events organized along the pillars of navigate – connect – thrive and offered every semester.
Role of the Director of Student Success and of the Academic Advisor
The Director of Student Success and Curriculum will:
- Work collaboratively with Institutional and Program leadership, faculty and students to develop meetings that support students to navigate – connect – thrive
- Provide structures and procedures to support documentation of meetings, communication, consistency, advisor training and accountability
- Help clarify and revise policies as necessary
The Academic Advisor will:
- Lead meetings each semester that assist the student in developing a program of graduate study that meets curriculum requirements. ). Students monitor their own academic progress throughout the Program using iOnline, the Worksheet of Required Courses (see Appendix A), the CSD MS Course Credit Tracker, and by updating their electronic KASA forms [SR1] (CFCC Knowledge outcomes - Knowledge And Skills Acquisition forms).
- Monitor the student’s academic records to make sure they are in compliance with ASHA certification requirements
- Sign departmental and Institute forms that require advisor’s signature.
- Advise students about relevant Institute and departmental academic policies when petitioning for waivers or unusual circumstances and bring petitions to the CSD faculty for action.
- Review the student’s academic record and provide academic counseling whenever necessary.
- Initiate and serve as chair of the Clinical/Academic Review and Support Team (CARST) when a faculty or clinical staff member identifies a need for intervention [SR2] (see 1.2).
- Assist students in identifying appropriate resources for personal and professional needs.
Role of the Faculty Connect Advisor
The Faculty Connect Advisor will:
- Meet with assigned advisees at least once each semester, individually or in small groups, but will meet individually at least once per year.[SR3]
- Develop a relationship with each advisee, demonstrating a commitment to the student’s success, growth, and development.
- Provide individualized guidance and advising around pillars of navigate – connect – thrive based on student interests and needs.
- Collaborate with the Director of Student success and Academic advisors to monitor and support progress toward academic and professional goals.
- Communicate with other faculty or staff as appropriate to address student issues per IHP guidelines. Advise student to complete Incident Report if applicable.
- Be informed about policies, procedures, and requirements and provide accurate guidance to students.
- Refer students to appropriate resources for academic, behavioral, or personal concerns and provide assistance if needed to access these resources.
- Participate in Clinical/Academic Review and Support Team (CARST) meetings as appropriate (see 1.2).
- File advisement documentation for easy retrieval and review.
- Establish and evaluate advising goals as a part of service in the annual performance review.
The faculty advisor can expect the Student to:
- Be able to identify their faculty connect advisor at the beginning of the program.
- Seek out assistance from the faculty connect advisor as needed.
- Respond to faculty connect advisor messages within 1-2 business days.
- Attend faculty connect advising meetings or give timely notice of unavailability, and initiate contact to reschedule.
- Come prepared to advising sessions to discuss relevant issues.