How Advising Models Stack Up: Advising at 2-Year vs 4-Year Institutions - Adventures in Advising

Thomas Beckwith with University of Florida leads a lively conversation with panelists: Tim Cox, Lafayette College; Kris Valentine, University of Florida and Shaura Thomas, University of Florida. Panelists break down what makes advising at two-year and four-year colleges so different—and why it matters. From centralized vs. faculty-driven models to the pace and scope of student interactions, panelists share real-world insights on how advising structures shape the student experience. They also dive into hot topics like the evolving role of advisors, the power of tech in advising, and why collaboration and professional development are more important than ever.

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Transcript

Thomas Beckwith  
Hello. My name is Thomas Beckwith. I'll be facilitating today's discussion with individuals who have been both in the two year college system as well as four year institutions. I currently work at the University of Florida as the Assistant Director of the Office of Academic Support. And joining us today, we have Dr. Tim Cox, Miss Kris Valentine and Miss Shaura Thomas. Dr. Tim Cox, can you go ahead and introduce yourself? 

Tim Cox  
Sure. Well, good afternoon, everyone. Thanks for having me on Thomas. Been great working with you. Tim Cox, I am the Dean of advising and co curricular programs at Lafayette College in eastern Pennsylvania, and I've been at Lafayette for about five years. Prior to that, I was at a four year mid sized public institution in the mid Atlantic. I also worked at a transfer receiving institution that was part of the same university system, and then prior to that, I worked at two different community colleges, one an urban community college and a suburban community college. So I feel like I've had some experience kind of shifting between institutional types these past 15 years.

Thomas Beckwith  
All right, Miss Kris Valentine, would you like to go ahead and introduce yourself? 

Kris Valentine  
Sure. Thank you, Thomas. My name is Kris Valentine. I am an Academic and Career Advisor, and I work for the heter school of business within the Warrington College of Business at the University of Florida. I've worked in higher ed for more than 17 years, so it's been a great, great experience, lots of variety,

Thomas Beckwith  
and we have our last participant on today's discussion. Miss Shaura Thomas.

Shaura Thomas  
Hello everyone. My name is Shaura Thomas. I am a undergraduate chemical engineering academic advisor at the University of Florida. I have been there for a little over three years, and prior to that, I was at Santa Fe College as an advising specialist for 11 years.

Thomas Beckwith  
All right, so we're just going to ask some questions about your experience within the two year college environment as well as the four year institution environment. All right, so one of the first questions I want to ask is based on your experience in both two year colleges and four year institutions. What are the most significant differences and advising practices between these two environments?

Shaura Thomas  
I would say that coming from a two year college is that advising is more frequent because you're focused on helping students through their initial stages of higher education, whereas whenever you're going to a four year university, it's more of a broader scope. So you're looking at the long term academic programming, the research opportunities, preparation for graduate school and any other kinds of specialized careers.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, agreed. I would say that I kind of look at the mission and advising model as the key significant differences. And I'm looking at like more centralized for our community college, where there's more so a professional advising model versus a split or a faculty advising model at the four year colleges and universities. And with that, I see difference between the frequent advising that Shaura was talking about, like the high touch advising that you get at the community college versus around more periodic advising around registration, graduate school, research opportunities for the four year institutions. And we always say that advising is year round, but I've definitely noticed the fact that with a more centralized and more professional model, students can access an advisor pretty much at any time.

Kris Valentine  
 I would agree with both of those perspectives as well, and just add that with the centralized model, which is what we utilize within the Warrington College of Business, it's very effective. But typically, from my experience, from a two year to a four year, it's actually more of a decentralized model. And the reason why I say that is I feel like students more at the university level, are looking, as Shaura mentioned, just more specialty and more major focus compared to the two year college, where, as char also mentioned, you know, we're, you know, really helping those students get familiar with college and just learning about what college is and what it can provide them. And you know, what the structure of colleges with accessing their courses, and what an academic plan is, and things like that. So we're utilizing a lot of those types of things, where more in the four year university, we're helping them, you know, get more involved, helping them grow. You know, being more independent, helping them with those leadership skills, etc. So I feel. Like all the things are kind of added into the university level compare more to the two year level, but they're both equally important, because we're looking at different types of students in each model.

Thomas Beckwith  
All right, my other question just second about something that you all mentioned. Um, thinking back, how has your advising style changed based on, you know, the work that you did in a two year college versus now being in the four year environment, what does that look like for you all? Do you have a specific advising style or when you think about student development theory, or any things of that nature?

Shaura Thomas  
For me, whenever you're thinking about it, from, say, a community college or a state college, it was more of a thinking about everyone as a whole, you know, kind of almost a one size fits all, but not really in that sense. Whereas whenever you're thinking about a four year institution, it's more specialized, because you're only thinking about that specific program. So for me with my chemical engineering students, I only really need to know chemical engineering, whereas when I was at the State College, I had to know every single track of an advisement track, and so I think that that's the difference, is that in a state college, I feel like you're a jack of all trades and sometimes a Master of None, whereas whenever you're at the four year university, you can actually dive in and actually know the content of what you need to be able To prepare your students for better with the advising.

Tim Cox  
Ditto on that. I I'm just thinking about on a philosophical aspect, my my approach actually has remained the same. It's a similar to showers point. It really is about advising the whole student here, and so in terms of them reaching their personal, educational and professional goals. We're looking at all aspects of the student, what they're bringing into college, and kind of how they can make meaning of their education. And so I use an approach that I always seem to talk about in a lot of these advising podcast meetings, something called the intersubductive relative advising approach, where I try to think of my own experiences as a college student and working with my advisees. And this can be across age. It can be across, you know, gender, it could be across, you know, all types of identities about we share that common role as a student. And so I know what it's like to fail a test, and I know what it's like to change a major. I know what it's like to drop a course. And so I'm able to kind of adjust accordingly when connecting with students across areas, and even if I don't have those same identities or have those same experiences, I've worked with students across those different areas at various institutions, where I can figure out a way to kind of help students navigate college accordingly.

Kris Valentine  
Yeah. And again, I would agree with all those perspectives as well. I think more for me and Shara touched on this too. Was the two year experience. I feel like you're really spending a lot more time with the student you're and I I typically use that checkering seven vectors theory, just because all those things get added in, and they do at the university level as well. But you know, you're really helping them develop that competence piece. You're really helping them with their emotions, you know, helping them with their identity. There's a lot of different things and purpose, you know, things like that. But really, just as an advisor, it it's more, I feel like advising is teaching, and that's my philosophy, and it's, it's not like they're just in my office for 10 minutes and that's it. I want to truly encourage them, help them know what my role is, what their role is as a student, and really help them evolve during their two year time at, you know, the community college and then versus the four year college, same thing, but I use more of an emotional development or psychosocial development model, just because they're, you know, less, as char also mentioned, it's more specialized, and they're really developing, you know, those leadership skills. They're focusing on career. They're more honed in on what is my next step after undergraduate coursework and things like that. So advising is definitely very different between the two models. They're both equally important. It's just, you know, it's hard sometimes when you only have 10 minutes with a student and what do you want to convey to them? So as everyone also mentioned, too, just, you know, developing, you know, the holistic model with students is also very important. So just adding all those pieces is definitely part of my day to day advising.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I just want to add on to that and probably ask a question that to Shaura and Kris, where you all are, are you also advising junior and senior students? So do you have faculty that are advising these students?

Shaura Thomas  
So for me, um. I advise students from their second year all the way to graduation in my department. So when they're freshmen, they're actually advised by the College of Engineering, and then they transition over into my department.

Kris Valentine  
Yeah. And for me, Tim, I'm more of all all things. So I'm centralized. So we have freshmen all the way through senior and beyond. We deal with combination degree as well. So we dabble into the graduation coursework as well. So it's kind of all the things.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, and the reason why I asked that question kind of comes back to one of the first comments I made about the advising model at the institution, even when I was at University of Maryland, Baltimore County, where we had kind of the split model, we were doing a lot of the advising support, per se, but we and we were advising students through senior year, but we were not considered like the advisors of record in the sense, and so students weren't coming to us for those substantial questions and conversations about like research and graduate school. They were assigned a faculty advisor or faculty mentor, rather, within their department to kind of have those more substantive conversations. But instead we just, you know, we're able to answer questions, maybe in their advisors absence, you know, what's the deadline to withdraw from classes? And so I definitely see how roles can change depending on the type of institution you're in and the model as it relates to your role at both the two and four year school. 

Kris Valentine  
To your point, Tim as well within our college, again, the advisors do all of the academic advising piece. However, we do have specialty things like our wealth management minor and things like that. They do end up going to faculty just because of the holistic mass, you know, just, you know, trying to think of the word everybody wants it, you know, everybody wants to get that minor. So because of the mass amount of students, we do have to have faculty advising for that.

Thomas Beckwith  
Well, you all said something that was sort of unique, and I thought about advising assignments, like, what was that like, as far as the role of advising assignments when it comes to being in a two year institution or a four year institution, like, how you are assigned a caseload?

Shaura Thomas  
So I'll say that whenever I was at State College, it could vary. I may have maybe 500, 800, 1100 students, but sometimes that didn't necessarily mean that I saw every single one of them because of our department at the State College is that we had multiple advisors. So a student could be able to see any one of the advisors, but if they wanted to speak with their assigned advisor who had that advisement track, then they could be able to see them for the two year, whereas for the four year, I have close to around 400 students right now, and they have to see me to be able to get their advising hold lifted and everything. And so that's honestly, that's what we're doing right now in the midst of of registration coming soon, is that a lot of the students are now coming to be able to see me, but that's a priority in terms of, you know, just of seeing, of the difference between a two year institution and then a four year institution, of where students in the four year they have to see you, as opposed to students in a two year where they can be able To see any the first available advisor.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I definitely noticed a difference in my advising assignments, and I think it's because my career path actually was kind of like advising adjacent. So I started as an admissions recruiter with advising responsibilities, then I was doing more of the student generalist role with advising responsibilities. And so it wasn't until I made it to the transfer receiving institution at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, where I actually had, like, an advising caseload. But in those three places, it seems as if, you know, to Charlotte's point, every student could have been mine at some point. So if they if I am available, and they're coming in with a question, I work with those students, and the beauty of it is that you learn to be a bit of a generalist, because you learn so much, you answer so many questions, you have to familiarize yourself with the curriculum. Now in a role as the dean of advising. I don't have a caseload, but when I started at Lafayette, I was responsible for both the junior and senior classes, and so small school, so about 700 students in each class Max, and those students were not required to meet with me at that point, because I'm not the advisor of record, but providing support to about 600-700 students is a lot. We're doing a lot of outreach, registration and things like that. So I can certainly see how even the assignments can vary depending on the role they need. Institution?

Kris Valentine  
Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that as well. And as far as case loads go, specifically, those are very unique. Because what's interesting about that, and Shara made a good point as well, is we don't necessarily meet with all of them specifically, so the advising style is different compared to two year versus four year. As far as how you reach out to your caseload, and what you're reaching out to them for, and what those touch points are, because you want to make your communication very strategic, so that way, you are reaching your audience at a peak time before that advance registration period begins, etc. But Shara mentioned something also very important about the majors are the tracks, rather through the AA, because you're, you're you're that generalist. But you also have to know what those transfer requirements are for each of those majors and for each of those universities. So that can be very tricky, because, as you know, information changes daily in higher ed, and we have to be as of the moment until something changes. So we have to, you know, keep our eyes out for that and make sure we're giving the students the best advising. So that requires relationships across colleges, across universities, across, you know, all the things when it comes to advising and just, you know, having your network of people. The other important thing too is at the university level, with majors, is you're also technically a generalist, knowing you know all the majors within the university, which there's a ton of them at UF, as we know, and other universities as well, but within your college, you are a specialist, because you know what your requirements are and what you're advising students on. But it's also very important to have that Jack of all, master of none, kind of feeling, because they're going to come in and they're going to ask you lots of questions, they're going to say, well, I want to be a, for example, a chemical engineer. I was thinking about that, but now I want to go into finance. So tell me what those career aspects look like, and having that conversation is very different compared to, you know, a two year college student coming in and not really understanding how the college environment works and, or, you know, when they need to meet with their advisor, etc. So you can see there's definitely, you know, just a huge difference when it comes to the to the models.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I just want to jump in on what Kris kind of talked about with working at two year colleges and having to know information beyond kind of your general area, like communication is key, and so not only do you need to be familiar with changes in curriculum or curricular rather requirements, transfer requirements, but also career Like practicum and placement requirements for the more practical programs, like nursing I can think about, you know, they had, like a mental health, like social work program that I kind of worked in another institution, and so we have to interface with various departments to advise our students, as well as outside institutions as well, right? If you have a student that's looking to transfer to another institution you're learning about that employers. I mean, just the the type of collaboration, I think, does vary much more broadly at the two year than it does at the four year, where you're kind of positioning them in the institution within itself at the four year college.

Thomas Beckwith  
Alright, thank you all for that. So we're going to step back a little bit and think about you know you all's transition between, you know, whether it's advising roles or advising adjacent roles or advising support roles. What unique challenges have you faced when transitioning between advising roles or advising adjacent roles in two year colleges and four year um institutions?

Kris Valentine  
Well, I guess I can start on this one. I know char, and I've had many conversations about this as we both worked at Santa Fe and then transitioned to UF about the same time, so it was a great, great honor to work at both institutions and have that experience together, but at the same time we both, and I won't speak for shara, but you know, struggled a little bit, not only with the system that's in place and how to navigate that, and then, you know, be able to work with students from that, the different perspectives that we've already sort of covered, but really just being able to hit the ground running with that advising, I think that is difficult, because it's not the same. It's 100% in my view, not the same. Again, we're looking at different types of students that we're working with. They all have, you know, we're human beings, and we all have needs, but it's a matter of finding what those needs are. You know, given the time that you have, for example, at Santa Fe we were allowed to, you know, they wanted you to be able to work with students in a quick manner, because there were so many students to serve, and you had, you know, multiple advisors, for example, on drop. In, but at the same time, if one advisor took an hour with that student, that would severely back up the other advisor. So it's a balance where you're trying to, you know, meet those needs of all the things in the quick in the quick time that you have, because the other key piece of that transition is helping you. Got to remember, as advisors, we're dealing with the same questions over and over and over and over, typically, maybe just different aspects of the same question. But that student, that's the very first time they're setting foot in your office. So it's a balance of, how do I communicate in a professional way, a caring way, you know, a supportive way. So that way the student knows that I'm their resource, they can come back to me for information and not feel that, that mad rush. Because you, you know, you have to imagine what students are walking into the advising office, and they see 100 students waiting in line to meet an advisor. They're probably like, oh my gosh, I'm never going to see an advisor. And am I going to come back? You know that that was the two year model. With the four year model, we have a unique system specifically, which is nice we have. I know many other advisors across UF use the same system, and maybe other universities too, but we use bookings, and it's great, because students are aware. We communicate in advance. They know when the advanced registration is. It's very streamlined, and it's helpful, because we're communicating with students in advance, so they're not waiting, you know, in line with 100 other students to see an advisor the same day they're booking in advance, they have the flexibility to book their own appointments. And it's helpful for advisors too, because it gives us the opportunity to really prepare for those appointments in advance. The way we pose our questions on bookings as well to you know, say, what are your needs? What are you looking for in this appointment? How can I help you? And you know we also have what's great about our specific department is our director helps us as advisors and sends out communication every advanced registration period as well to let students know. For all of the majors, here's recommended classes, here's all the things. So it kind of sets them up so they don't necessarily have to come see us, unless it's unless it's really an important, you know, question. So again, a big difference. But those are, you know, some of the challenges I had to deal with because I was used to kind of putting on that mom hat and really walking students through it, where at the four year level, it's, it's not so much like that, that you have your occasional student here and there, but for the masses, it's, it's not typically like that. So it's, you know, was a balance for me.

Shaura Thomas  
Say, just like Kris, is that, you know, putting on that different hats and everything, because working at, you know, a state college, you could be able to potentially spend a little bit more time with them, depending on what you're trying to actually convey to them. But then sometimes, when there is drop in and it's registration time, you may not be able to spend as much time with them. So those are some of the things. And then also of you know, helping students who have different academic backgrounds and certain needs of theirs, because you have some students who have an academic background where, you know, they've done AP, they've excelled, and they just go straight through, whereas then you have students who need to take developmental courses, and so now you're helping them kind of, you know, have that foundation and now building themselves up so that then they can be competitive to, you know, transfer to a four year university. And another thing that I would say that I had, you know, issues with of when I transitioned to, say, like, a four year was of learning about the academic requirements and knowing about how, you know, to me, I always have to think about it is like three levels. It's the department level, the college level and then the university level. So sometimes it would make it feel like the department wanted to override the university, whereas we know that the university is it, you know, at the top. And so just being able to understand those little nuances. That was something of a transition for me as well. Of what I had a little bit of difficulty in, but I feel like it's going a lot better than what it was like in the beginning, because me and Kris know this, and Thomas of you know being transitioned to UF is that we have to take these assessments to give us security roles and access. And while the assessments help us to be able to get those security roles in the same vein, they don't actively teach us later when we actually have to do it, you know, so now we have to go backwards and try and find all of that information. Whereas, you know, that's something that hopefully in the future for UF I would hope that they would do is to actually have more value in academic advising, you know, of being able to better prepare their advisors for that transition and everything.

Tim Cox  
Wow. Yeah. Do. Know, comments, as always, I'm glad we're all the synergy is this is great here. And want to kind of jump off what Krishad mentioned early on. Like, yes, it's definitely not the same. It's, you know, same, same role in terms of title, but in terms of responsibilities. Definitely see a lot of differences between the two and four year. I feel like, for me, the most unique challenge that I faced, really, was my advising approach. And I know we use these, these broad terms, like prescriptive advising versus development, too, but I can certainly see myself as more using a prescriptive approach, working with the two year students, right. Here's what you need. This will get you from point A to point B. The transferring out was the goal, and there was pretty much, well, I mean, once you've done that, like there's nothing else to do. But now, moving over to the transfer receiving institution, in four year, we're now working with students who are transferring in. So it is like the what next? So like, now that you're here, how do we navigate you? How do we help you navigate the rest of your college or educational experience, and now I'm using more of the developmental approach. I'm asking, Okay, well, you've done this here at XYZ school. What do you hope to do here? And so those conversations were remarkably different when I moved over to the four year college and university. And now even in this role, we see that the conversations are more about graduating the student versus, like the moving out completely. So it's the graduate school, it's the medical school, it's the research opportunities, is jobs and those conversations are also different between both institutions. So definitely notice the difference. But I think that my approach was the presented the biggest challenge for me.

Thomas Beckwith  
Well, you know, something that we all like within advising is in higher education, is technology. Please tell me how you adjusted when it came to using different software or learning the technology, because that sometimes can pose a challenge when you are transitioning, whether it's from a two year institution to a four year institution, or just transitioning from institution to institution. What was that transition like when it came to utilizing technology?

Shaura Thomas  
I will say that whenever I transition from a two year to a four year, it actually opened up more opportunity for me to know more technology. I can tell you right now that Qualtrics and DocuSign are my friends because they have helped. You know, of me being able to sit there and streamline certain advising processes before you know, we would have students come in with an actual, you know, paper document, so want to sign something and get it signed, and they had to go all around campus to try and get a faculty to sign the research form, whereas now I've made it as a DocuSign, where it's a DocuSign power form, where they just put in their name, put in the information, and it sends to the people to get signed. It comes back to me, and I register them for the classes, the same as for advanced registration. I have a advanced registration Qualtrics, where I have students, you know, fill out the information, put in their curriculum plan. As long as the curriculum plan is good, they get their advising. Hold lifted. So that's my other way of being able to serve, you know, 400 plus students and stuff, of being able to do it that way, so I can feel like I have more time, so I don't feel burnt out of actually having to see each and every one of them. But I'm seeing them, but I'm seeing them through another form of communicating. 

Kris Valentine  
Yeah, same. Oh, go ahead. Tim, nope, nope. After you, I would say the same with shara, I would say PDF has become my friend just because of the different uses that it offers and the way you can formally sign documents and save them, and then, you know, have that official communication with students, also, particularly in our department, we manage projects. We have different projects that we manage. And I use a platform called Gravity Forms or Wordpress. It's a really great system, and it's a way for us to manage all the incoming major changers. So it's a great way to streamline and make you know the system, you know, a lot easier, but that's something that you couldn't necessarily work on or do as a new advisor, even coming even as an experienced advisor, coming from a two year institution, because you're learning all new systems as a whole. So to the question of, you know, Is it challenging? Absolutely, but as Shaura said, it's, it's also you know, a good thing, because you're, you know, really, you know, opening yourself up to more communication with the technology and how you can work with students. But like anything, you just navigate, navigate the pluses and the minuses as a whole. But I will say the different system systems you'd like to. One from this system and another from this system, and make your own system. But of course, we don't have that opportunity to.

Tim Cox  
that's exactly what I was going to say. In a sense, you know, we know that there's going to be a learning curve for anyone transitioning from an institution new job, and we can certainly look at it as a challenge, but it's definitely, you know, looked at as an opportunity. So now you're learning more than one system. So whether it's crowd tricks, DocuSign, Adobe, PDF maker, the booking software for appointments, our CRMs, ways that we can keep Advising Notes, I have been able to determine, or look at certain platforms and say, wow. At XYZ institution, it was like this. This was so smooth. And then kind of point out where there are gaps. And perhaps, depending on your role, you can advocate for investment, for additional bundles, for software programs. And so maybe we can add something, or perhaps encourage administration to consider a new platform. And so that's been super valuable. And kind of transitioning from from place to place. I have not seen any differences in terms of institutional type. It just seems like they're going with whatever was affordable and inconvenient for the time being. But I see banner schools. I see, you know, illusion people soft like those schools. They vary, both two and four year program. Use those, but it really is how they manage it all. I think that determines how we navigate the rest of the technology. 

Thomas Beckwith  
How have you seen the role of an advisor evolve across the two year institution and the four year institution. And what do you think the future of advising holds in both environments?

Tim Cox  
I'll jump in on on that one. I and it's very interesting kind of looking at it now, being at an institution with a faculty advising model that appreciates the professional support that advisors can can give them, but also being at a place at a at a two year college that was more centralized, but would also benefit from having faculty have more of a hands on approach with their students, I see that The role of the advisor is probably going to combine both both aspects in the near future, because we're realizing that there are differences between the two in terms of scope, but as well as relationships. And I know that there are some students at the community college who are, you know, would benefit from having a faculty member or someone within their field advise them and help them make meaning of their education. And then there's some students at the four year school, the four year school who saying, Hey, I just have a couple of questions. And you know, I think that I have an idea where I need to go here. And you know, perhaps I don't need to make an appointment with my faculty advisor because they're, you know, working on a major project, but I can connect with the, you know, advising office to discuss these things here. So I certainly see conversations, or been part of conversations, not necessarily just at Lafayette, but other places where they are considering, looking at various models of advising to meet the needs of the students, because they're changing as well.

Kris Valentine  
Well, I guess, I mean, for me, just, you know, it's definitely an involvement. It's, it's, you know, as we've already touched on, it's just not the same role. I think, I think for a brand new advisor, I will say this, someone who's never advised before, and they come into the advising role in a four year institution. That's I, in my opinion, humble opinion, I think that would be a lot more challenging just because of all the things that they're navigating compared to starting at a state college level. Not that it's easier, but it, you know, it allows you to connect with students a lot more. So that evolvement piece across the two settings, you know, that's a big, big piece. And then also, you know, like you mentioned already, Thomas, about the technology, because there's multiple things you're juggling with technology more in a four year setting compared to a two year setting. I've worked in multiple two year settings, so not that you're not using a lot of technology, but I would just say that, you know, it's not as prevalent or necessary for the type of role you're doing as an advisor, but other advisors that have, you know, more unique roles may be using more technology as far as the future of advising, I think, Well, I'll say this first. I think being in a four year institution has evolved me greatly, personally, interpersonally, professionally, because it's allowed me to really hone in on all of the skills I've learned over the years in the different advising settings. And it's, I mean, while we're never perfect, or, you know, even close to that, but at the same. In time. You know, I think in the role itself, we become more, you know, streamlined for for an advisor, because we're efficient. That's really the word that I'm getting at. Because we've learned, you know, how to navigate a student very quickly, just based on the developmental theories and all the, all the theories, and then, of course, knowing what their needs are, being able to speak to those needs, and knowing which technology you do need to use, and under the advising model that you're using within that office, and really how to kind of, you know, help the students. So in other words, you know, compared to the two year model, like I said, I use the example of a drop in advising, you know, if you know, there's one advisor on the whole team with that model that is spending more time with a student, and you need to get them in and out, because you've got to, you know, you know, handle the masses. It's, it's so much different at at the four year level, because you're able to do that. I look at my surveys from my students. I always, because we survey every student after the, you know, the session, and I tell them, they walk in, I'm like, You're gonna have an amazing appointment today. We only have 10 minutes, but let's get to it, you know, let's, let's get to the need of what I can help you with. And I've had so many comments on those surveys of, you know, oh, Kris was great. You know, she helped me with my stress, and she was able to do all my questions in 10 minutes. Because, as we know, students always wait until the advanced registration period or the registration period to come and see their advisor, and they always hold all the things that they want to discuss. So in other words, they're not coming to us when that hold initially goes on, or they have a petition that they need to submit, or they're unclear about, you know, what their next semester schedule should be. They're not thinking about all that until the registrar hits that, you know, button in their student portal that says, Hey, your your registration is coming up. You better get in there and get your classes, you know, registered. That's when it's like, oh, light bulb. I better see my advisor. So all those things you know, what we learned to navigate very quickly and efficiently. So really, that's how this role has helped me. I feel it's made me more efficient. I feel wake way more confident than ever, as far as being able to handle the multiple questions that come at you, and being able to answer those effectively, and, you know, with with the best knowledge possible, and be able to direct them to the resources that they need if I don't know the answer,

Shaura Thomas  
just like how Chris said, is that what I take from being at a four year institution now is being more effective and being okay to say, I don't know, to a student, you know, especially if there's something that they have a question about, and I have maybe never heard of it before, and I say, Well, let's try and find it out together, or let me get in contact with somebody who may have the answer, or at least get us to the right contact. When I think about the State College. I think about, you know, you're just pretty much getting your feet wet in terms of stuff, of trying to have that building block before you go to a four year institution. And I could say, for me, is that every advising department is different depending on what department and college they're under. So for me, I'm the primary contact for most things, even if it's sometimes a little bit out of the advising scope, most of the students think to come to me. And sometimes I have to sit there and go, wait, I'm the contact for that. I didn't know, you know, and so now I have to go and figure out, what is this all about. But I will say is that even though sometimes there are certain things that might be given to me, I do have the ability to go and ask and say, What is this about? So that then later I start making out, you know, handouts for myself, so that then I can be able to learn a process and be able to help anyone else that may end up transitioning into our department, whether it's another advisor, whether it's advising leadership, anything along those lines, because now I'm able to use all the information that I got from a scenario or a situation, and then be able to impart that to them, like I legitimately just did that yesterday with one of our advising leaderships, because they just needed to know a background of something. And I'm like, here's this PDF, you know, of all the information. 

Tim Cox  
And when we talk about how our roles are shifting or evolving, Shaura, just that. And Kris is just that, right? I it we, you know, they say advising, but I think we have to, even, even as a a discipline. Keep trying to define what an academic advisor is, because we are doing so much, you know, in our in our daily work, right? And it's not just helping the students select classes. It's not just helping the student make meaning of their educational experience. There are some counseling aspects, there's financial aid aspects, there's admissions aspects, there's the grad. School aspect, there's the career aspect, there's the personal aspect of all of those things. And I feel like that our our roles are evolving into that kind of like larger, big picture of kind of like what an advisor is, and that's definitely something, maybe another conversation for another day, but like advising, and it's kind of like what what we do. But hearing Kris talk about technology a bit also kind of begs the question about, like, how AI might impact the role of the advisors, evolving role. Again, that's another conversation, another panel for another day. But I mean, I just think about students wanting information right away, right quick information, by the way, who can I ask if I can't get into someone? How do I do it? If I need more than 10 minutes, where do I go? And I certainly see that that might be another direction or something that we're going to have to grapple with as we move into the future.

Thomas Beckwith  
Here's the something that you all sort of indirectly touched on when I say the word autonomy. How do you think about that when it comes to the two year setting versus the four year setting? Because, based on some information that was provided, and depending upon the role that you have now, it seems like you all have a little bit more autonomy based on your current role or based on what you're doing, whether it is directly advising or administrative tasks.

Shaura Thomas  
Yes. So for me, I feel that I have more autonomy being in a four year institution than what I did in a two year institution, even though, don't get me wrong, I loved being a part of a team, you know, because we could all be able to help each other out. But I also know that if I have some task that I have to complete, that I know that I'm the one responsible for it, and that it needs to be efficient, it needs to be done, and I'm not waiting for somebody at the last minute to be able to, you know, chip in, or anything along those lines. So I do like being able to have more of the autonomy at a four year institution, because I think it also opens the door for growth. And also it shows, you know, if you were to go to, say, a different college, a different department, what have you, it also shows to them of how dedicated that you are in terms of student success and everything as well.

Kris Valentine  
Yeah, and I will piggyback off that as well. Shaura, particularly in our roles as advisors. We teach our Warrington welcome course, which is our first year experience for students, which I suspect many of the colleges do that, but particularly we work with peer leaders, which is our students. So having the opportunity to really lead and CO lead and work with students on that level is is a leadership role in itself. In addition to that, we also have individual unique projects among our advisors, which we manage and control. Basically, we work with our, you know, associate directors, and we we get, you know, we work with them in the leadership team, but we get to manage those projects. It's great opportunities for growth. Our our model as a whole. We haven't we have an awesome Dean, we have an awesome College. We have an awesome everything, but the culture is specifically for you create your role as an advisor. Yes, you have the duties and roles and responsibilities that you have to administer, you know, and the tasks and things like that, but you get the opportunity to really lead, and that is also including among your team. So as an example, I mentioned before that, you know, I work specifically with major change students. I solicited our team, I held a meeting, I had a teams chat. I wanted to see what's working. You know, what the team thought about our eligibility criteria, etc. And you know what all that you know looks like, and what what their thoughts and things are so as a team, you know, we voted, you know, and then we work with leadership on making sure that those changes go into effect. So it's a great opportunity, from multiple perspectives, to grow as an advisor and really allow you to think about what you want as a career. You know, do you want to stay in advising as a career. Do you want to move up? Do you want to, you know, do different types of opportunities? So it's, it's great because it allows us, you know, that opportunity. So to to your point and question Thomas about the two year versus four year. I did have that opportunity at the one of the two year institutions I work for as well, but just on a different level. But then at the other two year institution, I did not have that opportunity. So, you know, it depends, I think, where you work, what their model is. I think as char touched on too, but it's, it's definitely a big difference here for me, and it's, and I definitely have a lot of autonomy. 

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I agree. I always say that it depends, it depends on the person's role, depends on the program and the structure of the administration and the institution. And so whereas I believe in all aspects of my role as advisor, even from being on the front line to being in administration. I felt like I was able to exercise a bit of autonomy in terms of how I connected with students. However, in terms of, like, how I advise them, or what I advise them on, it was more structured based on the program, engineering, nursing, you know, those programs are so prescribed. I didn't really have much autonomy in terms of, you know, changing or helping students explore the curriculum as much as I would, let's say, at a liberal arts institution where that is the goal for students to kind of look at all areas of the climate course of study. I'm looking at the structure and how we can perhaps impact practice versus policy. You know, you know, for a while, you know, we had, like, walk ins, right? And do we now go to a system where every student must set an appointment? And is that something that we can exercise across the institution? That is something that depends on your role at the institution, and policy, more specifically, you know, great, great repeat policy, commencement policy, you know, withdrawals, like all of those things in terms of like, how you can kind of change or navigate certainly depends on your role. And I think the last example is about like our role in orientation and even in assessment at institutions that I've been in, advising was under enrollment management. So it was a great partnership there where advising was a huge part of the orientation program, and we had autonomy to figure out how we were going to bring advising into orientation. Then being at an institution where advising is part of the academic division and orientation is being housed as a student life, it's different. So the partnership changes, and so we have to kind of work a little bit differently to figure out how we can make advising become an element of the orientation program. I like to say that my team, you know, I allowed them to use their own practices, but it's really it changes based on the institution, in terms of, like, how far you can go with that, outside of just advising.

Kris Valentine  
One more point,Tim, about students, they also have autonomy as well with the systems that we use for technology with bookings, which is great because they don't have to call a front desk person. They don't have to, you know, try to schedule. It's very easy. They just go on to your bookings link, they see what your availability is and they schedule it. So from that end as well, students have really enjoyed that autonomy as well. So it's, it's, it's a win, win. 

Tim Cox  
they also get a chance, in some cases, to maybe connect with an advisor that they want to meet with, right? So they can see your booking and they can say, hey, I really connected with Kris. I want to connect, you know, move forward with Kris. And then some of the areas where advisors are assigned, in some cases, students don't have the autonomy to just go to anybody, right? You are going to the advisor who is the specialist or, kind of the advisor of record in your area. So that kind of gives that other, other side of it.

Kris Valentine  
Absolutely.

Thomas Beckwith  
Just thinking about something from a personal perspective, what specific skills have you developed over the years that have helped you succeed in both settings when you that, when you sort of put both settings side by side,

Shaura Thomas  
I would say, for me, is to have written and verbal communication skills of having better of them, because sometimes when you do talk to whether it's students administration, what have you you know, being able to definitely make sure that you're understanding, or having them understand where you're coming from, or explaining something is very important, also being proficient in technology, or being open to learning new technology. That's also helped me organization and time management, I can tell you right now, of just, you know, being in a four year institution and having additional duties on top of academic advising, I have to always try and figure out, how can I be able to get this done in a certain amount of time, and how can I organize my day so that I can be the most efficient during that time period? And then I would say, you know, building rapport. I think that's very important. Of building rapport with students, building rapport with your colleagues faculty, so that then they can understand of who you are as a person, but also understand of who you are as a professional as well. So I feel like those things have helped me in terms of adapting from a two year institution into a four year institution. 

Kris Valentine  
I'll go ahead, I guess Tim, I was gonna say Allah said too, but also, really just leadership, I think, as an entry level advisor, when you begin this profession, it's a different mindset. It's a different and again, depending on the institution and what the roles and responsibilities are, it's the model but leadership. Because again, in our roles, you know, we're not treated as you sit there from eight to five or whatever and take your hour lunch and you're monitored. It's you're you're you're a professional, you have advanced degrees, you have a mindset, you you know what you're doing. I mean, you know, our office is big on culture and making sure that, you know, we hire on merit. We hire on, you know, advisors that can bring those skills and qualifications to the role, but also expand that to our students and be those leaders for students. Because, again, you know, we're one of the top business schools, you know, in the country, and with that comes great responsibility, you know, along with our world renowned faculty. So, you know, we may have not majored in Business ourselves, but we carry a lot of those just skills as to what the industry knowledge brings. And we, you know, communicate that with our students, we interact with our students. You know, I've been a student advisor for an organization, and also, you know, taught with our peer leaders things like that. So there's lots of multiple things, and led different projects among the team. So it's a great opportunity to really develop yourself and to change your mindset and build that confidence level. I think that's a key piece. Because I think sometimes advisors, and this is just, you know, being in the business for a long time, and, you know, working with other advisors, they may not feel there's advanced opportunities or roles that they can, you know, move into beyond an advising role, but there are a lot of us, though, me in particular, I love advising. I love the student face, face time that I get with them. I like being able to interact with them and change lives. I like meeting students where they are, and not use these buzz words to just say it, it's true, like when they come in my office. I want to remember, Oh, we talked about that student organization you were in, and you were, you were going to be rushing, you know, during that time, what, how did that go? Did you get in, you know, things like that. You want to build those rapports with the students and, you know, really build that involvement. So, you know, there's lots of things, but those are, those are my, probably my top ones.

Tim Cox  
And if I could kind of think my top three certainly skills that I've learned over the time that has helped me in both settings, reading the catalog and interpreting policy and curriculum is the best way. And I think that that has certainly helped me in terms of figuring out how I can advise students with the most accurate information, understanding the mission, I think, has also been super helpful, and looking for opportunities for leadership. So like Kris mentioned, you know, I had a very, I would say linear, linear progression throughout my career. But I think it's because I actually sought out those opportunities, especially when we are I was able to identify problems in practice at the institution, and being able to make suggestions to my supervisor, and being able to run with that, I think, has been super rewarding for me, and I think while doing that, learning a bit more about the structure of the academic program in the institution has helped me, but also the fact that no student is the same, that is the biggest skill that anyone can learn. They say a student is a student as a student. Dr. Karen Archambault said that to me when I first started at Brookdale Community College. And she's and she's right. And I am now at an institution where the average age, you know, 1920 but I've been at institutions where, you know, the age can change to like 50 and 60. But a student is a student, you know, and their situations are different. We'll never have the same two. And I think once we recognize that, it kind of helps us in terms of how we help other students, no matter where we are.

Thomas Beckwith  
All right, I have a few more questions, and then we will in today's session. So the second to last question is, how do you collaborate with colleagues across different advising structures? When you think about your time in a two year institution versus a four year institution, and what have you learned from these collaborations?

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I'll jump in on on that, I think in my role now, since I'm not directly advising students, I My role is to basically collaborate with various divisions across campus. But I'll maybe go back to where I I was at at Hudson and Brookdale Community College collaboration. Has been not as challenging as I probably would have expected it to be, but I think it's because of the the culture of the institution in which I've worked, where everybody had the goal of working with a student, and as it related to like, financial aid, if I didn't have the answer, I would be able to reach out to the financial aid office. If it was related to accessibility services. I didn't have the answer, I was able to kind of connect with someone there. I think establishing relationships with colleagues at the institution is super important because you always have that one person that you can call on. But I think business continuity is also important, if any event that that person isn't there, but that you aren't there to answer the question. And so I feel like collaboration definitely takes a group effort, but kind of identifying at what points will you need to kind of connect with another office? Communication is also key. So when there are changes happening within your area, sharing it out has been helpful, as other departments will do the same.

Shaura Thomas  
I would also say, of being able to collaborate with colleagues is that you can be able to collaborate them, you know, doing professional development, attending conferences, I find that sometimes, especially when attending conferences, is that you find a lot of advisors, you know, or advisor adjacent, roles alike, and then you end up finding out that you have some of the same pain points at times, and we end up talking with each other so that then we can be able to get ideas about how can we better assist our students in the end? Because, of course, our common goal is student success, and how can we be able to get them prepared for graduation? So I feel like being able to collaborate with you know, either colleagues inside of your institution or even outside of your institution, and getting different perspectives is very beneficial.

Kris Valentine  
I would agree with, with everything Tim and Shaura said as well. And maybe just add that, I think it's important to to reach out to other colleges within the university, you know, even if you don't have necessarily anything director working with with that college, but just getting to know the other advisors, especially when questions come up about, oh, how does you know, can, how does your, you know, college sub a course or something like that, when it relates to your student or something? So just, you know, meeting with the other advisors and just getting to know them that way, they can put a name with a face, and in attending events, and just, you know, I'll say, within our college specifically, like the student organizations and things like that. Because we have so many events all the time, it's so great to get out. You do tend to forget there are other colleges that you can, you know, interact with. So it's good to kind of see what other college events are doing, and maybe attending those workshops, you know, things like that, and just being able to, you know, just reach out. So for example, too, I had a major change student, just to use that as an example, and they were going through a College of Liberal Arts and Science. Well, I needed to figure out if that student was admitted to their college specifically, or to UF as a whole. So I reached out to one of the Associate Directors. Never interacted with them before, introduced myself on teams, and we had a great conversation, and now we've connected. So it's just simple things like that, of, you know, just just taking the initiative to reach out and, you know, offering, you know, a name with a face, and, you know, saying, hey, I'll see you at the UAC event this year the conference, as char mentioned things like that. So I think it's just important to interact and just really, you know, introduce yourself.

Thomas Beckwith  
Something to follow up on what you all were talking about when you think about collaboration. Has that changed based on this, the environmental setting, whether it's being in a two year or a four year, or is it sort of the same.

Shaura Thomas  
I think it's changed, at least for me, a little bit because of the fact that me being able to talk to different colleagues, whether they're in different departments of engineering or outside of the, you know, College of Engineering, anything along those lines, that has been able to help me see different perspectives and how to do stuff differently. Because, you know, if I probably would have been in the two year setting, sometimes in a two year setting, it's something like across the board of how everybody does certain things across the board, whereas if I all of a sudden decide to go to college of business or college of education or College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, then I have different perspectives of how they do stuff, and maybe they're actually teaching me maybe the correct way you know, of how to do something and navigate it, or I end up teaching them something that. They may have not been aware of because I do have sometimes some people from different colleges that reach out to me, and they're just like, oh, we heard that you have a Canvas course for your students and everything, like, how did you go about getting it? Could I have access to it? You know? So those types of things, of being able to collaborate and have partnerships with each other, I feel has been more advantageous to me at a four year institution.

Kris Valentine  
I would agree with that. I would say more at the two year institution, for the last institution I was at, there wasn't a lot of collaboration, just because the role was very specific and it was more geared toward the advising piece. Specifically, there may be times where you would reach out to faculty about a question or something like that, but in general, there wasn't a lot of reach out. There were some. But at the four year institution, it's it's 100% open. It's definitely engaging. It's definitely a different experience. It's definitely something that allows you, again, to put that autonomy in your day and that leadership hat on, and be able to really kind of navigate, you know, your role as an advisor, and how do you want your role to be? You get to create it. So, you know, there's lots of perspectives here and lots of things we're probably missing in this conversation, but just basically what char said is, I, you know, I felt a little more, I guess, kind of in a box at the two year institution, compared to here is all I'm saying. I'm not saying that you couldn't reach out. It was just that it wasn't necessarily necessary because of the role.

Tim Cox  
Yeah, I mean, you all said it best. And I guess to summarize it, it depends on the role, depends on the institution where advising sits. I feel like, again, I've had wonderful collaboration experiences at all institutions where I've been. I think that the level of collaboration changes based on where the advising program sits in the institution. So orientation, enrollment management, student life, is it Academic Affairs? Student Affairs? I think that determines kind of how we collaborate on larger policy and even programming. But I do say that, you know, to Shaura and Kris' point at a larger institution where there are different schools and divisions and academic advising can kind of take on its own lens for the lack of words. I think you definitely have more opportunities to collaborate, to learn best practices across those areas, whereas, if it's more centralized or maybe out of smaller institutions or just my own, I think we can certainly collaborate across departments, right? Engineering can kind of connect with chemistry. Can, you know, connect with anthropology and sociology? But I think that some of these larger, four year public institutions, or even larger private institutions that have different schools, that have their own advising programs, allow for more collaboration across best practices as it relates to how they connect with their students.

Thomas Beckwith  
And then here's just a final question to wrap up today's wonderful conversation. What advice would you give to advising professionals who are considering moving between two year colleges and four year universities or four year institutions in their careers? 

Shaura Thomas  
The advice that I would give for advising professionals is to build a strong network of colleagues, ask many questions, understand that not every policy and procedure in the institution is the same, and to give yourself grace during the transition, because sometimes learning new new avenues of policies and procedures and everything. It can be a little bit overwhelming. I can say that personally, for me, when I transitioned to a four year institution, is that I was used to at a two year institution, knowing pretty much everything. People always came to me and for almost the first time of transitioning to a four year I was like, I don't know. I don't know. So I had to learn to give myself grace. And then also, I had a strong network of colleagues that also that I could be able to go to, and they could tell me, you're doing fine. It's just going to take time. Some of them will sit there and tell me, I've been here for over 10 years, and I've never heard of what you just told me about before in a scenario. So I'm like, Okay, I'm not doing so bad. Like, month six in, I'm not doing so bad, you know? So I would just say one of my my biggest things is to give yourself grace and give you time to learn. And every time that you learn, it's a win.

Kris Valentine  
Yeah. I mean, I definitely would agree with all that as well, and just really to add to it, knowing what your personal strengths and weaknesses are, and thinking about the fact that you are interacting with the student that you can make or break their experience. Um, you know, students sometimes are scared to come and talk to us, so knowing that you can really interact with that student at a level that engages them, or you can de engage them and make them run away. So it's really important to know what your strengths and weaknesses are, so you can work with that. When working with students. It's not always easy, because, as we know, people have different personalities, different perspectives, and then, of course, all the theories that we're working with, but and then knowing the time constraints, but really just, you know, thinking about who you are as a person and how that role fits in with who you are, and how how you want to navigate that it's there isn't a one size fits all model for it. I feel because, as we've talked about throughout this session, it's just, you know, it's navigating all the things, because there's so many things, things we haven't even touched on today, but just knowing that it just comes down to their students or people, and you're a person, so those personalities you just gotta work with and knowing what your strengths and weaknesses are.

Tim Cox  
And you've probably heard me say it several times in this conversation, but it always depends, right to Kris' point, there's no one size fits all institutions aren't the same, even if they're within the same type of student population, right? So no two year colleges are the same. No, uh, two four year colleges are the same. You have HBCUs, we have religious affiliate institutions, we have liberal arts colleges. And so you do have to think about your own mission within higher education and how it aligns with your own, uh, goals and values, and what is the fit for for you, right? And and when you're looking at, you know, applying to different institutions, depending on whether it's going from two to four year, you have to be able to explain to the hiring committees how you can use your experience to kind of help the overall, big picture. Students are not the same as well, right? But they are still students, and so you're able to kind of use those experience across the board to think about how you can kind of help. But I do think that you have to have some knowledge of the institution that you're planning to apply to, or that you're planning to work at. And if you do, you don't have the experience. Think of ways that you can build that network that Charlotte talked about, go to the conferences, make some connections, you know, visit some of those places, do some reading and learning, because ultimately, you have to be able to, you know, to to show that you are marketable, regardless of the institution that you decide to to be a part of and share your talents with.

Thomas Beckwith  
Well, you know, I want to thank you all for today's insightful conversation about your experiences of working in to your institutions and for your institutions, it was a wonderful conversation to have, and I look forward to chatting with you guys in the near future.