Advising Woes

Only a handful of students typically approach economics concentration adviser Jonathan V. Hall ’06 in the days before the deadline for handing in completed study cards.

But on the day signed study cards are due, Hall says he witnesses a line of students that stretch inside the department’s Littauer Building, forcing some individuals to wait for hours on end.

“I know who has to sign my study card, but it’s kind of unclear who my advisor actually is,” says Katherine He ’10, an economics concentrator who reconsidered plans to pursue a graduate degree in economics partially because of “the lack of help that was present in the undergraduate economics department.”

In an effort to remedy this ambiguity, the economics department, which sees the largest number of concentrators in the College, is engaging in large-scale reforms of its advising programs, further centralizing its advising structure by eliminating three of the seven graduate student concentration advisers, replacing them with one dedicated staff concentration adviser.

This centralization breaks from the advising model for government, the College’s second largest concentration, which will introduce an undergraduate peer counseling system to bolster a wider sense of community.

Together, the revisions of the two advising systems will impact one in four Harvard students.

Both concentrations have suffered from poor advising in the past: A 2001 survey of Harvard seniors showed that economics and government concentrators rated the quality of their departmental advising at 2.57 and 2.62, respectively, compared to the college average of a 3.19 on a five-point scale.

In subsequent years, the two departments have undertaken reforms that reflect contrasting ideologies about advising.

The economics department seeks to centralize its program by employing fewer, but more specialized, advisers in Littauer. On the other hand, the government department hopes to disperse its advising resources to reach a wider range of students.

The newest changes in advising in these two departments reflect these differing philosophies—but questions remain as to whether either reform will be successful in improving students’ satisfaction with the guidance that they receive.

‘DO IT BY YOURSELF’

Three years ago, the economics department transitioned from using tutors in Harvard’s residential Houses as concentration advisers to employing a group of seven graduate students to advise students out of offices in Littauer.

According to Jeffrey A. Miron, the director of undergraduate studies in economics, the original system had presented a number of substantive issues for the department.

“Sometimes we could not find an adviser for every House,” he says. “Sometimes we had issues with quality control.”

But the reformed system of advising appears to have bred a sense of detachment between the department and concentrators.

Advisers expect undergraduates to personally seek them out, and students say they feel alienated from advising resources—a sharp contrast to the advising system’s mission as expressed by economics undergraduate program administrator Emily R. Neill, who oversees the administration of the advising program.

“For me, advising is about making students feel like we know who they are,” Neill says.

Yet Hall says that he does not know the names of all of his 150 advisees, mainly due to lack of student traffic into his office in Littauer.

Concentrators agree that their advisers very rarely know their names, as the graduate students typically only meet their advisees in study card signing lines.

“I don’t know anyone [in economics] who used their adviser for anything—ever,” says Jason D. Sherman ’10, an economics concentrator.

Sherman adds that he believes Economics provides an “extreme example” of a concentration where students receive relatively little guidance.

“The whole culture in the economics department seems to be ‘learn it by yourself,’ or ‘do it by yourself,’” He says.

THE AUDACITY OF SATISFACTION

The economics department’s hypothetical long-term plan is to hire up to three staff concentration advisers, who will replace all seven graduate advisers. Though the number of economics advisers would be cut by more than half, the department’s hope is that the incoming staff adviser would bring a specialized interest to the job.

Sherman says he is excited about the new structure because “a staff member might know more, and be able to dedicate more time to advising.”

But economics concentrator Colin J. Motley ’10 says that the loss of a graduate student adviser might actually increase the disconnect between students and advising resources, since a staff adviser may be less integrated into the department and may “not be the kind of person that you want to talk to in a meaningful way.”

Faculty in the economics department express similarly mixed views about the potential benefits of the change.

Department chair John Y. Campbell says that while he has been concerned about the recent ratings for economics advising on senior surveys, he is “very optimistic” that further consolidation could provide improved experience for concentrators.

“Hopefully students will come to know the adviser, come to trust that person, and word of mouth may have a beneficial effect,” Campbell says.

Yet the low scores for economics advising on the senior survey may not even necessarily be a function of poor advising quality, according to Miron.

“I think our low score for advising on the senior survey is partially reflecting dissatisfaction with the large classes in the economics concentration,” he says.

A GOV CONNECTION

Though government—Harvard’s other mammoth concentration—is making a parallel move toward advising reform, its tactics mark a significant departure from the principles guiding the economics department’s decisions.

In 2006, the government concentration switched to House-based advising after working with a hybrid of House advising and centralized advising based in CGIS for a number of years.

The residential concentration advisers operate within an official advising capacity and are capable of signing students’ study cards. They are also responsible for holding weekly office hours and meet on a monthly basis to discuss upcoming deadlines and other concerns.

A number of government concentration advisers praise the system for the ways in which it allows them to bring advising directly to students.

“At 10 o’clock at night in the dining hall, I can recommend classes or answer questions,” says Brodi J. Kemp, theLowell House government tutor. “It’s really nice to have that.”

In a reflection of the desire to maintain a government advising community, Kemp says that  the department has also pushed to ensure that the majority of the House advisers are residential tutors, as opposed to non-res tutors who are merely affiliated with a House.

“I think the residential House advisers are so convenient,” government concentrator Bradford O. Bailey ’10 says. “The advisers are mentors and models for academic life and academic issues.”

And the newest advising reform—the recruitment of a group of rising juniors and seniors to serve as peer concentration counselors (PCCs)—will help the department further develop a sense of community among concentrators and advisers, administrators say.

Cheryl B. Welch, director of undergraduate studies for the government department, says the PCCs will provide concentrators “another contact for course selection” and will encourage “conversations about the courses and the material,” while drawing on personal experience.

Welch adds that while she hopes to further improve government advising in the future, she plans to maintain the House-based system as the central pillar of the department’s advising.

“It seems to be a fairly good way of bridging the gap, of bringing down a big concentration to a manageable size,” Welch says.

THE WIDER DISCUSSION

As the concentration advising systems in economics and government continue to evolve over the coming years, the successes and failures of these programs may inform the structuring of advising in other Harvard departments.

As Campbell notes, economics has already drawn “inspiration” from the life sciences, which has used a staff advising system for several years.

Both Welch and Karen Kaletka, coordinator of undergraduate studies in the government department, express interest in seeing how the economics department’s changes in advising might influence senior exit survey results—information that could possibly be used to inform the government department’s own efforts at advising reform.

—Staff writer Gautam S. Kumar can be reached at gkumar@college.harvard.edu.

—Staff writer Evan T.R. Rosenman can be reached at erosenm@fas.harvard.edu.