By some measures, UVA is tops. For one, it’s the only public school to be in the Top 20 for graduation rates (92 percent and above), and it has the highest African-American graduation rate of any public university, two stats which College of Arts & Sciences Dean Ed Ayers says are UVA’s “proudest.”
But, the University also has a comparatively high faculty-to-student ratio (15-1), and students consistently say advising sucks, two disappointing facts pointed out by Ayers at a January 22 presentation to the Board of Visitors Educational Policy Committee (www.virginia.edu/bov) on undergraduate advising in the College.
 Students give low marks to advising, departing Arts & Sciences Dean Ed Ayers told the BOV’s educational policy committee.To the rescue: potential endowment funds to connect advisers and students. |
Luckily, UVA has a no-fail formula for solving any problem: Endow it!
Students have complained they are looking for advisers that, um, know something about their major. Advisers are overbooked and increasingly deal with students who are preprogrammed for double majors and lack a sense of academic adventure.
To help mend relationships, the College instituted a seminar program two years ago called COLA—College of Liberal Arts—where freshmen meet once a week with their adviser in a small classroom setting. So far about 100 students have signed up for the program.
The College also began paying top student advisers $1,000 more per year to take on a heavier case load. The result? Improved advising that donors might notice. “Somebody could endow something like this,” to the tune of about $10 million, Ayers said of the COLA program.
Getting someone to endow fledgling solutions to deep-seated problems for $10 million? We like UVA’s odds.
