Academic Advising and Resources

Thinking about Academic Planning

Advising at St. Lawrence University is a four-year process of planning an academic career that will give direction to and serve as foundation for the good life you imagine. You should begin by thinking of each of the four years of college as separate: in the first year, you will discover St. Lawrence as a place, a living community, and the possibilities of the St. Lawrence curriculum; in the second, you will become clearer as to your particular goals — majors and minors, study abroad options, internships; in the third year, you will engage in major study in earnest; and in the fourth year, that work is completed, synthesized and concluded. Thoughts turn to life after graduation.

Given such a trajectory, advising is focused on helping you make this process happen in ways that make sense for you as an individual. It involves you posing, asking and getting answers to goal connected questions. It also involves determining and following a particular selection of courses from semester to semester and year to year, going ever deeper into a major (or two majors), a minor (or two), and the liberal arts generally.

The key to success in this process is academic planning, the intentional mapping of your academic, intellectual and co-curricular life so as to achieve a fully integrated University experience. Academic planning goes beyond simply selecting courses. Ideally, it includes thoughtful reflection about a particular course of study so that you choose courses and plan semesters according to a broader set of academic goals. Academic planning also means fully examining and taking advantage of the intellectual and co-curricular opportunities that are available to enhance your coursework.

If you have a question over the summer about course choices, requirements, programs of study or anything else academic and not sure whom to ask, drop an e-mail to fypadvising@stlawu.edu or call 315-229-7397. An experienced academic advisor will respond to your question or point you to the appropriate resources.

Academic Advising in Your First Year and Beyond
In your first year, your advisor is one of your First-Year Program (FYP) professors; you may also request a second advisor in your primary area of academic interest. You may continue with your FYP advisor for your sophomore year, or may select a new one. When you declare a major, normally during the second semester of your sophomore year, you then choose an advisor who is affiliated with your major.

Because a satisfactory working relationship with the advisor is of paramount importance, and because at a liberal arts college students’ interests often change as they progress through their education, you may change advisors at any time. The associate dean for academic advising programs, who is a faculty member, works closely with faculty, both those in the FYP and those in academic departments, to ensure that students get properly advised. In addition, the associate dean oversees the office of academic advising programs, which brings together the work of the coordinators of academic support, academic achievement and academic services for students with special needs. Those offices work with each other and the First-Year Program and student life staff to ensure that first year students have the support and services they need.

Academic Resources Available to You
Making the transition to college, most students find that its new academic environment requires adjustments to ways they go about their academic work. Expectations are higher, needed skills are more various, time management is more of a challenge. To help students adjust to these new demands and to succeed from the very beginning, St. Lawrence offers a robust menu of academic support programs which both respond to student needs and track those who experience academic difficulties. They are:

Services for Students with Special Needs
Since many students come to college requiring accommodation to their learning style, the staff of our Special Needs office works closely with students who identify with such needs. The director and assistant director serve as facilitators and advocates for students with disabilities, be they learning, attentional, physical or psychological. The University complies willingly with all federal and state statutes and regulations concerning provision of assistance to those with documented needs. Students who identify themselves as having a disability and provide documentation of the disability are assisted in finding the academic assistance they need. This process usually involves a written Individual Education Accommodation Plan (IEAP) for individual courses where accommodations are needed. For more detailed information visit the Special Needs Web site.

Academic Support and Academic Achievement

St. Lawrence employs two full-time professional staff who work daily with students who want to improve their academic performance. These services are both immediate and longer-term, providing students with help in their current classes and also with academic skills development. If you seek to improve academically, you can request an individual meeting with the coordinator of academic support or of academic achievement. Additionally, students can request regular meetings with either person for ongoing academic support. If you and the staff member find it useful, the meeting may lead to connections with other supportive resources on campus, such as academic advisors, professors, course teaching assistants (TAs), peer tutors, the WORD Studio, the Quantitative Resource Center and the counseling center.

Peer Tutoring Program
The academic advising office provides peer tutors in almost every subject, and for almost every introductory-level course. Peer tutors are St. Lawrence students who have distinguished themselves academically and have been selected and hired after an application process. If you have a strong academic background, and wish to improve your ability to communicate with others, you can do so by becoming a tutor. All tutoring services are free. Requests are made online, with students and tutors matched accordingly.

Academic Skills Workshops
Any student, student organization or faculty member can request workshops in academic skills such as goal-setting, time management, note-taking, syllabus mapping, reading strategies, test-taking strategies, stress management and breaking down big papers. The academic services staff is prepared to respond very quickly to requests for workshops and works with faculty, staff and students to expand continuously the kinds of workshops we offer.

For further information, call the office of academic advising programs at 315-229-5964 or visit our Web site.