Understanding How Student Organization Advisors Approach Advising

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to examine how advisors learn and develop their individual approach to advising. A lack of research exists that examines how the professionals responsible for advising student organizations on college campuses learn to approach their position. Resources available for professionals on advising student organizations from the institution are prescriptive, providing practitioners with a list of items to include or avoid when advising an organization and are most often found on the institutions web sites.

This study used a mixed method research design and examined full-time institutional employees who are responsible for advising one or more student organizations on campus as part of their positional responsibilities. A two-phase sequential exploratory strategy (Creswell, 2003) was used and priority was given to the qualitative data. The decision to use this research design is grounded in the desire to understand the phenomenon associated with an advisor's application of knowledge to practice.

This research confirmed the anecdotal literature which identified the way in which advisors of student organizations learn to advise is through trial and error and vicarious learning (Bandura, 1986). Data from this study furthered our understanding of how advisors learn to advise revealing that on the job experience, observed undergraduate experiences and graduate school are additional areas in which professionals are learning to advise student organizations. The results of this study took expectations of the advisor from the literature and constructed an instrument based on those roles and functions. Through exploratory factor analysis four factor components were revealed that explained the expectations outlined in the literature. The findings of this study also indicate that a difference exists between how advisors prefer to approach advising with individuals and small groups (officer teams) and how they prefer to approach advising with the full membership.