Freshmen Want More One-on-One Support After Harvard Overhauls Advising

Freshmen arrived at Harvard this fall without assigned pre-concentration advisors, after the College eliminated the role as part of an overhaul of first-year advising.

A few weeks into the semester, many freshmen say they are relying heavily on Peer Advising Fellows for academic questions — and still wish they had a dedicated advisor for one-on-one guidance.

Before this fall, pre-concentration advisors met individually with freshmen and helped them navigate course selection, academic decisions, and campus resources. Harvard eliminated the role in May, replacing it with a broader “network” model that directs students to different sources of guidance depending on their questions.

The Crimson spoke with 10 freshmen across a range of prospective fields. Several said their PAFs and other upperclassmen had been their most useful sources of academic advice.

Eliza E. Teo ’30 said she “bombarded” her PAF with questions during course registration.

“She was a great help to navigating the really dense, overcrowded — not in a negative way, but just a very full — course registration process because there’s just so many courses online,” she said.

Daniel N. Ong ’30, who is leaning toward a concentration in Human Developmental and Regenerative Biology, said he has yet to reach out to a concentration advisor but has spoken frequently with his PAF about the pre-med track.

PAFs are one part of Harvard’s first-year advising network, alongside proctors, resident deans, faculty members, and academic departments.

But several PAFs told The Crimson that they have fielded significantly more academic questions from freshmen this fall than in past years, including questions outside their own fields of study.

Frederick L. Klein ’28, a PAF for Wigglesworth Hall, said there was not “some really coordinated effort to have PAFs know everything about academics.”

“I don’t think that there should be either because I think that PAFs already have so many random trainings that we have to do,” Klein said.

Freshmen also entered the semester after participating in a new summer advising process. Incoming students attended a 75-minute small-group advising session over Zoom before course registration, in place of the individual pre-concentration advising meetings held in previous years.

Six freshmen told The Crimson that the group sessions did not significantly help them choose courses.

Kris N. Lau ’30 said the sessions left out information he later found important while navigating course registration.

“It never really talked about how to navigate my.Harvard, how to use the course selection, or talked about any specifics,” Lau said.

Assistant Dean for First-Year Academics Katherine Veach wrote in a Wednesday statement that the new model was not meant to be a shift away from personalized advising, instead encouraging students to seek advice from faculty members and department staff.

“The change is not a move away from individual advising or relationships, but from expecting a single assigned generalist to have the expertise to answer every academic question a student may have,” Veach wrote.

“Faculty, departments, and other academic experts are also part of the network, and students are encouraged to build relationships with them as their questions and interests develop,” she added.

Some freshmen said they had already been able to make those connections.

Joseph S. Saba ’30 said he met the coordinator of the Global Health and Health Policy secondary field at an advising fair and was offered a one-on-one meeting to discuss his academic interests.

“That being a pathway is incredibly important to me because I think that one-on-one specialized experience, time, tutoring, and mentoring will be able to greatly help me in navigating something that I’ve really never had any experience with,” Saba said.

But other freshmen have had more difficulty connecting with departments. Melissa A. Le ’30 said she contacted a concentration advisor in the Neuroscience department on Sept. 1 but had not yet received a response.

The advising overhaul came amid broader upheaval within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. In an August PAF training, Harvard College Dean David J. Deming described implementation of the changes as “halfway at best,” adding that he wished administrators had more time to adjust advising resources and networks after a wave of FAS layoffs over the summer.

Dean of Undergraduate Education Amanda Claybaugh told PAFs at the same meeting that that part of the rationale for eliminating pre-concentration advisors was that the system was not proving effective.

Two sophomores who experienced the old model echoed some of that criticism, saying their pre-concentration advisors lacked familiarity with the fields they hoped to pursue.

Lily S. Madison ’29 said she felt the role of a pre-concentration advisor was not needed for first year students.

“It kind of just felt very superfluous in every way,” she said.

Morgan Ly ’29 said her advisor’s academic background was not related to the field she was considering.

“I was gonna major in physics, but instead of encouraging me to explore the physics pathways, they were really insistent that I take a humanities course to balance out the course load,” she said. Her advisor was affiliated with English at Harvard.

Still, eight of the 10 freshmen The Crimson spoke to said they thought having a dedicated academic advisor would be helpful. Several pointed to the difficulty of selecting courses before arriving on campus.

”I still think we need someone that has dedicated time for us,” Saba said. “I think the changes to the add-drop period, where students are required to take the classes before they even come on campus and they don’t get that week to experience them, really hurts.”

—Staff writer Celine Muir can be reached at [email protected] or Signal at celinem.33. Follow her on X @celinemuir1.

—Staff writer Alexa M. Schmitt can be reached at [email protected] or Signal at alexaschmitt.15. Follow her on X ​​@alexa_m15_s.