Making Known the Real: An Exploration of Academic Advising Practices in a South African Higher Education Context

This is the first in a series of papers that emanate from the author’s doctoral research. This research explores academic advising as a profession and academic advisors as practitioners in the South African Higher Education sector; it focuses on advising within the Faculty of Commerce, Law and Management (FCLM) at a research-intensive public university in South Africa. During the period of investigation, academic advising engagements between students and the author were logged, thus forming a baseline dataset for the doctoral study. In phase one of the data analysis, baseline data were coded and clustered into overarching and subsidiary categories. The baseline dataset consists of 34 subsidiary categories, which form part of seven overarching categories; it contains 2240 entries based on 1023 consultations with 614 individual students during the three-year period under investigation. Using Archer’s (1995, 2000, 2005) notions about Social Realism as a theoretical framework, the author critically scrutinises the complex nature of the work that academic advisors do in a layered analysis of the baseline data. The author posits that it is through these layers of interpretation that one moves from the layer of the Empirical (experiences), through the layer of the Actual (events), to what Archer calls “the Real”, that is, the layer of mechanisms or underlying driving forces that brings about what happens in the layers of the Empirical and the Actual. This paper focuses specifically on the role of the academic advisor; it postulates inferential observations about academic advising by using the baseline dataset as a way in, while keeping the academic advisor central to the discussion.

Design and Build Chatroom Application as Student Consultation Media Based on Android

To support the government’s program in preventing the spread of COVID-19 virus, it is expected to reduce direct communication between fellow students and lecturers. The purpose of this research to create interactive media that can provide consulting service for students with academic advisor (PA) without direct contact. It is expected for this research, students can be more proactive in interacting with their academic advisor in discussing academic and non-academic problems. The method used in this research is using Android Studio and Visual Studio Code as an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and using a no-relational (NoSQL) realtime database on firebase. The advantage of this research is that the system to be developed does not use physical servers anymore but all databases are stored in the cloud system. The result of this research is chatroom application consisting of 7 modules namely application login with username and password, searching user, chatting user, list consultation, student input consultation, edit data consultation, and account setting.

Enhancing Academic Advising In Credit Hours System Using Dss

Academic advising plays a vital role in achieving higher educational institution’s purposes. Academic advising is a process where an academic advisor decides to select a certain number of courses for a student to register in each semester to fulfil the graduation requirements. This paper presents an Academic Advising Decision Support System (AADSS) to enhance advisors make better decisions regarding their students’ cases. AADSS framework divided into four layers, data preparation layer, data layer, processing layer and decision layer. The testing results from those participating academic advisors and students considered are that AADSS beneficial in enhancing their decision for selecting courses.

Tools for Describing the Communicative Space of Scientific Schools

To manage research activities, it is necessary to develop up-to-date tools that allow to quickly and efficiently assess the effectiveness of the scientific space functioning. Contradictions between the new industry of scientific communication and traditional forms of preserving and multiplying intellectual capital have become more acute, new points of interaction between the institutional structures of science (scientific schools, “invisible colleges”, expert and experimental (real and virtual) laboratories, etc.) have appeared. The concepts of the cultural codes of representation and translation of the subjects (individual and collective) of scientific communication have changed, and there is a need to update the requirements for the culture of their identification and positioning in the age of digital technologies. A scientific school is a multi-purpose collective that simultaneously implements the functions of production, dissemination, protection of scientific knowledge and reproduction of scientists. The cultural traditions of its functioning, as well as the cultural norms of institutionalization, are being transformed.On the material of bibliographic description of the genesis and development of the cultural studies school of the Southern Urals (centered in the Chelyabinsk State Institute of Culture), the article shows opportunities for scientometric and informational analyses. The author offers to discuss and use two bibliographic publications (the catalog of the scientific school and the bibliographic navigator, which include information about research topics, successful scholars, scientific leaders, postgraduate students and applicants, opponents, leading organizations of the communicative field of cultural studies of the Southern Urals), as well as cultural researchers’ landmark publications, innovatively identified by the method of introspection. The publications are reviewed as tools in the system of cultural studies of the scientific school positioning.The article draws conclusions based on the study and comparison of the configurations of connections between persons (academic advisor, postgraduate student, opponent), leading organizations and scientific leaders and their geolocation, subject headings: “applicant — academic advisor — opponent”, “subject heading/topic — leading organization — opponent, specialty number”, etc. These connections are individual for the related concepts: “management — coordination”, “interpretation of a communicative challenge — adequacy of a communicative response”, “practical meaning — purpose of communication”. These areas of analysis of the scientific school functioning provide a vision of the scientific interaction communicative fields’ intersection, the increment and examination of scientific knowledge, the basis for making managerial decisions to organize science.

Understanding students' perceptions and attitude toward learning about internships in a business school

PurposeInternships are an integral part of a college curriculum, yet students are sometimes unaware of how to secure this opportunity. This research aims to determine efficient methods to provide information to students within the given majors, identify barriers on what is stopping students from seeking out internships earlier and identify the appropriate time for students to receive internship information.Design/methodology/approachThis study undertook descriptive research in a preliminary investigation of the undergraduate business students' attitude toward learning about the internship program offered by a business school of a state funded university in Michigan, USA. The data-collection instrument consisted of structured closed-ended questions relevant to undergraduate business students' perceptions and attitude toward learning about the internship program.FindingsThe results of this survey of 631 undergraduate students revealed a relationship between gender and the willingness to gain information about internships. Additional findings revealed that students who received information at the beginning of their schooling were more likely to plan for the internship in advance. Finally, students who preferred to receive information about internships multiple times were most likely to contact their academic advisor or internship director for more resources.Originality/valueTogether, the results of these findings can be used for current institution and other business schools with similar setting to reduce the barriers students face and allow undergraduate business students greater accessibility to internship positions.

Voices of Undergraduate Students With Disabilities During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Social distancing, lockdown, and other restrictive measures imposed because of the COVID-19 pandemic led universities to transfer to remote online instruction. Several studies examined the impact of online instruction on students’ academic and socioemotional performance, whereas only limited research evidence exists concerning the performance of university students with disabilities (SWD) during online learning. This exploratory qualitative study aims to understand the experiences of nine undergraduate SWD during the COVID-19 pandemic. A thematic analysis revealed that SWD experienced multiple adversities related to academic (e.g., accommodations, communication with university instructors, academic advisor) and socioemotional (stress, routine disruption, lockdown effects) areas. We compared and contrasted our study findings with existing literature on creating equitable academic environments and reducing access barriers for all students.

The Role of Feedback in Psychological/Emotional Well-Being: A Study on Research Assistants

The aim of the study is to examine the role of feedback and intrinsic motivation on research assistants' psychological and emotional well-being. First, an Effective Feedback Scale adapted to sampling was developed through expert opinions, focus group interviews and piloting. Afterwards, a field survey was conducted, and two separate models were tested on the data of 278 research assistants to examine the effect of the feedback received from academic advisors (feedback of academic advisor, FAA) and department heads (feedback of department heads, FDH) with the structural equation modeling approach. It was found that the FDH is more effective than the FAA on the emotional well-being of research assistants in the workplace. The FAA has a greater impact on the psychological well-being and intrinsic motivation of research assistants than the FDH. The effect of feedback received from both groups was significant on intrinsic motivation, which increased both psychological and emotional well-being significantly. In addition, the feedback characteristics that had a positive effect on well-being were identified as allowing dialogue in giving feedback, giving it for development and assistance, its being objective and positive, and including a solution proposal.

Impacts of Sense of Career Calling and Perceived Career Development Opportunities on Work Engagement: A Case Study of Undergraduate Academic Advisor

This article studies the impacts of sense of career calling and perception of career development opportunities on work engagement, taking academic advisors as survey object. An online questionnaire survey was carried out on academic advisors of colleges and universities in Henan Province, China. Purposive sampling is used for the convenience of data collection, and a total of 400 valid questionnaires were received. SPSS statistical software is used to conduct descriptive analysis, independent sample t-test, and regression analysis of sample data. Research results show that academic advisors have a higher sense of career calling, perception of career development opportunities, and work engagement. Married teachers have a higher sense of career calling, perception of career development opportunities, and work engagement. Sense of career calling and perceived career development opportunities have a significant positive impact on work engagement, and career mission has a greater impact on work engagement than perceived career development opportunities. This research can help college administrators and decision makers realize the importance of the psychological needs of academic advisors in improving work engagement.

Does Advisor Gender Affect Women’s Persistence in Economics?

Women persist in the field of economics at significantly lower rates than men. We show that the gender of an academic advisor is an important determinant of female undergraduates' persistence in economics. We use data from a four-year college where first-year economics majors are randomly assigned to advisors who are also faculty members in the economics department. Advisors help students choose courses and monitor their academic progress. We find that having a female advisor rather than a male advisor reduces female students' first-year dropout rates and increases their likelihood of graduating with an economics degree.