Cynthia Heel an

Organization Of Advising Services
　　The way advising services are organized may have an effect on student outcomes. Gordon, Habley and Associates (2000) describe three models for organizing counseling and advising services: centralized, decentralized and shared models. In a decentralized effort advising services are provided by faculty or staff within an academic department. Overall coordination could be centralized while advisors are accountable to their respective departments. A centralized organizational structure usually has an advising center, which is the administrative unit. This center has a director and advising staff and they are all in one location. Everything is contained in this advising unit that students would need from orientation to graduation. In a shared model advising services are shared between faculty or staff in academic and central administrative department advisor or sometimes students are served by both an advising center and a department advisor all through out their college career. (Gordon, Habley and Associates, 2000)

Problems Related to the organization of Advising
Declaring a Major
Many of the students who come to community colleges are undecided about their goal. Vincent Tinto found that indecision about ones major filed of study and future career goals eventually had a negative effect on student success. (Tinto) Kankakee Community college found goal clarity to be a major factor as well. They identified the fact that having an end result in mind was what gave students the motivation to persist from semester to semester and also helped them understand the relevance of their education. “A student who is uncertain about career goals struggles with the ability to persist in a class that may seem irrelevant. This indecision can result in negative effects on a student’s ability to stay in school and complete their degree.”(Walsh, 2000
Some colleges used a special degree program as a place for undeclared students to explore and to work out their direction (HVCC advisors, 3/13/01; SDCC counselors, 10/12/00). Between 2,ooo and 2,600 students were enrolled in Individual Studies at HVCC at the time of the interviews (HVCC Advisors, 3/15/01) and SDCC students were enrolled in General Studies. (SDCC counselors,10/12/00). In these programs , advising, counseling, assessments as well as coursework in various fields gave guidance to students.