Anonymous wrote:well in fairness, the guide could have said "advising here sucks so make sure you take a COLA so at least you get to know your advisor in the first year rather than just being assigned". We don't know the context.

The COLA advisor for first year students is a joke. Fabulous in concept, laughable in implementation. Very unresponsive. (This refers to students taking a 1 credit COLA course their first semester, which gives them a de facto adviser.) I’ll be curious if this is changed with the revamp of student advising this year.

Anonymous wrote:"Advising here sucks," said the UVA tour guide

I thought maybe the tour guide was just having an off day.
But I've seen this type of comment in numerous threads here at DCUM, and also at College Confidential.

For those of you who have had direct experience with UVA's advising being "hit or miss" etc,
what exactly are the issues?

- professors don't spend enough time with the student?
- the courses are always full?
- the curriculum is hard to navigate?

Thank you in advance for sharing!

As a parent of a third-year student, I can validate the tour guide’s assessment. Indeed, the University recognizes how spectacularly poor their advisory system is, announcing last year an overhaul of university advising this year. That remains to be seen. Assigned student advisors/professors for first year students are not responsive and often are not even remotely connected to students areas of study—even students in pre-professional areas. A computer science major could easily be assigned a philosophy professor as their adviser. Even by large university standards, UVA comes up short (and it is only mid-sized). Students end up relying instead on on-call associate deans who rotate and don’t know them, though some are good at responding to tactical questions regarding waitlists, add-drop policies/strategies, changing majors, etc. The professor-advisers, by contrast, generally are notoriously unresponsive. My theory is that UVA has gotten away with this not only because of its ranking but because it has a large population of hyper-motivated students who will find ways to press on regardless of unusually poor advising. Make no mistake, there are consequences for students for this shortcoming at UVA, including not discussing with students when it’s appropriate to change majors, change courses, not overload themselves their first year, etc. As a former educator at a large university, I’ve frankly been shocked by what I’ve seen. It is the university’s Achilles heel.

More appalling is that my DS has had undergraduate TAs one grade above him rather than graduate student TAs, including in courses such as computer science. As a former TA myself, I’ve never seen this at a state university. TAs often serve as informal advisors when the rest of the advisory system fails (read: is inaccessible). Doctoral students are in a better position than undergrads to TA (lead discussions and grade) and provide solid informal guidance, as well as to write recommendation letters for study abroad, internships, etc.

If my student was applying today, I would suggest to them that they grill the Dean of Students’ office (not tour guides) on what changes are being made to student advising. Students neither want nor need their hands to be held, but for $70k a yesr (out of state), they are entitled to responsive, sound, and engaged advising, particularly at important junctures of their academic careers.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had two kids attend UVA and both say that they were happy with their advisors whenever they called upon them. Which wasn’t very often. Not everyone needs hand holding. Except, that is, the parents of CTCL students whose kids couldn’t get into UVA and who are obsessed with justifying their insistence on going the second and third tier private school route.

Biased much? I went to a school that is on the CTCL list where the students were on their own in different cities and parts of the world on different experiential programs 1/3 of the time in school. Exact opposite of hand-holding and required much more independence than my kid who is at a large university. Regardless, don't know why you had to bring this into the conversation which was about what the advising was like at a particular school.

It's not like course registration is some deeply needed independent skill--but good advising can help you finish in 4 years since it's often impossible to know which courses you will need will be offered when at some schools except through advising--and colleges of all sizes can have good or bad advising in this regard.

Look, if you went to Harvard or Amherst or something, fine. Crow to your heart’s content. But beyond that, if you’re not going to UVA in state it’s because you’re either crazy or you didn’t get in and have an axe to grind. Like OP. There is not a snowflake’s chance in hell that the UVA tour guide said what OP says. Anybody who thinks otherwise is just plain stupid.

It's simply too difficult and too desirable and competitive to be one. My kid REALLY wanted to be one but didn't make the cut.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had two kids attend UVA and both say that they were happy with their advisors whenever they called upon them. Which wasn’t very often. Not everyone needs hand holding. Except, that is, the parents of CTCL students whose kids couldn’t get into UVA and who are obsessed with justifying their insistence on going the second and third tier private school route.

Biased much? I went to a school that is on the CTCL list where the students were on their own in different cities and parts of the world on different experiential programs 1/3 of the time in school. Exact opposite of hand-holding and required much more independence than my kid who is at a large university. Regardless, don't know why you had to bring this into the conversation which was about what the advising was like at a particular school.

It's not like course registration is some deeply needed independent skill--but good advising can help you finish in 4 years since it's often impossible to know which courses you will need will be offered when at some schools except through advising--and colleges of all sizes can have good or bad advising in this regard.

This is why I don't like the CTCL marketing scheme but I don't care enough to post about it when there are ongoing fights. We took our SN DS to the CTCL presentation at a hotel in Maryland years ago and it was what it is - a bunch of mid-level struggling colleges which pay to belong to this traveling consortium that claims "to change lives" - well it's clever but not true. I went to one of those slacs now more likely to be presented at a CTCL and it wasn't life changing or really anything special. No matter how small the classes are, how good the profs are, how good the marketing is, how much money you are paying, it still comes down to WHAT IS YOUR KID GOING TO DO WITH THIS OPPORTUNITY? If they are going to party and drink - well there's your answer. If they aren't going to do the reading and will be passive in class - then there's your answer. If they are going to be angry about every and protest at every turn - then there's your answer. Or! are they going to grab ahold of the $80K a year opportunity and really dig in and read and try to master the material and be active in class and LEARN? to read and to write? And to engage with the professors? Who will write their letters of recommendation? If the latter, then any SLAC or university will do because the child will succeed anywhere. If in the other groups, CTCL isn't going to make a bit of difference but YRMV.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine doesn’t go to UVA but he and his roommates have all said the job of the advisors at their school is to keep them in school for five or six years.

Also false because UVA has one of the highest four-year graduation rates at 94.3%

Reading comprehension--the PP said it about a school that was explicitly not UVA.

no reading comprehension issue = the implication was clear. And why do people like you just go off on these "reading comprehension" issues? Why divert a thread with such nonsense? It's almost as if there is a group of DCUM'ers who feel intellectually inadequate so they like throwing out the "Reading comprehension issues much?" line whenever they can - even when it doesn't make sense. Just what VALUE are you actually adding to the conversation? NONE. Do you feel better about yourself trying to bring someone down by posting this? I've actually never understood the banality of the practice. So even when I see that someone on DCUM has actually IRL misread or misunderstood something, I try to help them by saying "I think 2:15 meant . . . ." Why throw out an insult? It certainly didn't work with me. I can buy and sell you before breakfast

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My daughter and I toured UVA last March and our tour guide said the same thing! We were so surprised to hear the tour guide being so negative about the school. She also told us that UVA was lacking in mental health resources. She said their hotline left her on hold for 30 minutes until she gave up/hung up. I have heard the negative comments about advising and know that can happen at a state school. Nevertheless, I was surprised to hear so much negativity from a tour guide.

OP here. You just reminded me that our tour guide also mentioned that mental health resources were not good at UVA. Even said that there's a 2-year wait list for counseling. Tour guide said she hated her freshman year and wanted to leave.

Just really surprised about the tour. I was expecting to be dazzled and leave the place with DC wanting to apply to ED.

We registered for the tour on the UVA website. Maybe our tour got hijacked?

Should we tour again?

If there was a two year wait to see a psychologist, you’d see news stories about it. People would be all over the this place, college confidential, etc talking about.

You have a teenager. Can’t you chalk this up to a kid having a bad day or is your teenager perfect?

Anonymous wrote:My daughter and I toured UVA last March and our tour guide said the same thing! We were so surprised to hear the tour guide being so negative about the school. She also told us that UVA was lacking in mental health resources. She said their hotline left her on hold for 30 minutes until she gave up/hung up. I have heard the negative comments about advising and know that can happen at a state school. Nevertheless, I was surprised to hear so much negativity from a tour guide.

OP here. You just reminded me that our tour guide also mentioned that mental health resources were not good at UVA. Even said that there's a 2-year wait list for counseling. Tour guide said she hated her freshman year and wanted to leave.

Just really surprised about the tour. I was expecting to be dazzled and leave the place with DC wanting to apply to ED.

We registered for the tour on the UVA website. Maybe our tour got hijacked?

Should we tour again?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had two kids attend UVA and both say that they were happy with their advisors whenever they called upon them. Which wasn’t very often. Not everyone needs hand holding. Except, that is, the parents of CTCL students whose kids couldn’t get into UVA and who are obsessed with justifying their insistence on going the second and third tier private school route.

Biased much? I went to a school that is on the CTCL list where the students were on their own in different cities and parts of the world on different experiential programs 1/3 of the time in school. Exact opposite of hand-holding and required much more independence than my kid who is at a large university. Regardless, don't know why you had to bring this into the conversation which was about what the advising was like at a particular school.

It's not like course registration is some deeply needed independent skill--but good advising can help you finish in 4 years since it's often impossible to know which courses you will need will be offered when at some schools except through advising--and colleges of all sizes can have good or bad advising in this regard.

Look, if you went to Harvard or Amherst or something, fine. Crow to your heart’s content. But beyond that, if you’re not going to UVA in state it’s because you’re either crazy or you didn’t get in and have an axe to grind. Like OP. There is not a snowflake’s chance in hell that the UVA tour guide said what OP says. Anybody who thinks otherwise is just plain stupid.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine doesn’t go to UVA but he and his roommates have all said the job of the advisors at their school is to keep them in school for five or six years.

Which school ?

Or, at least, is this a National University, a regional school, an SLAC, or an LAC ?

Thank you in advance for your response.

My kid goes to GA Tech. His friends at UGA and GA southern have said the same thing. Advisors suck,

Anonymous wrote:I had two kids attend UVA and both say that they were happy with their advisors whenever they called upon them. Which wasn’t very often. Not everyone needs hand holding. Except, that is, the parents of CTCL students whose kids couldn’t get into UVA and who are obsessed with justifying their insistence on going the second and third tier private school route.

Biased much? I went to a school that is on the CTCL list where the students were on their own in different cities and parts of the world on different experiential programs 1/3 of the time in school. Exact opposite of hand-holding and required much more independence than my kid who is at a large university. Regardless, don't know why you had to bring this into the conversation which was about what the advising was like at a particular school.

It's not like course registration is some deeply needed independent skill--but good advising can help you finish in 4 years since it's often impossible to know which courses you will need will be offered when at some schools except through advising--and colleges of all sizes can have good or bad advising in this regard.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"Advising here sucks," said the UVA tour guide

I thought maybe the tour guide was just having an off day.
But I've seen this type of comment in numerous threads here at DCUM, and also at College Confidential.

For those of you who have had direct experience with UVA's advising being "hit or miss" etc,
what exactly are the issues?

- professors don't spend enough time with the student?
- the courses are always full?
- the curriculum is hard to navigate?

Thank you in advance for sharing!

I am not a big fan of UVa but I don't think that's fair/surprising. Any large public Univs will have limited resources to for advisors. Also, remember, you are in college. You are supposed to find your way yourself. Don't expect someone to hold your hand

I am a huge fan of UVA (H and I both went there) and posted upthread that a UVA tour guide said the same thing to our group (maybe it was the same tour guide?) Anyway, I agree with PP - advising is definitely an issue at many large public universities based on the tours we've attended.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
That's normal in a large university, OP. You can't expect the same level of hand-holding as in a small college. That's why the large uni tour guides usually don't mention it, and small college tour guides insist on it.

+1. It’s a large state school. Kids who need more hand holding should look at smaller private schools…

This. I went from a small private HS to a large, public university. The difference was insane. However, it was the 90s so I managed. Today's kids might be different. I get the sense that more handholding is expected, where I didn't think much of it other than "oh, well".

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine doesn’t go to UVA but he and his roommates have all said the job of the advisors at their school is to keep them in school for five or six years.

Also false because UVA has one of the highest four-year graduation rates at 94.3%

Did you read the previous statement?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mine doesn’t go to UVA but he and his roommates have all said the job of the advisors at their school is to keep them in school for five or six years.

Also false because UVA has one of the highest four-year graduation rates at 94.3%

Reading comprehension--the PP said it about a school that was explicitly not UVA.

Anonymous wrote:"Advising here sucks," said the UVA tour guide

I thought maybe the tour guide was just having an off day.
But I've seen this type of comment in numerous threads here at DCUM, and also at College Confidential.

For those of you who have had direct experience with UVA's advising being "hit or miss" etc,
what exactly are the issues?

- professors don't spend enough time with the student?
- the courses are always full?
- the curriculum is hard to navigate?

Thank you in advance for sharing!

I am not a big fan of UVa but I don't think that's fair/surprising. Any large public Univs will have limited resources to for advisors. Also, remember, you are in college. You are supposed to find your way yourself. Don't expect someone to hold your hand