November Minutes

November Minutes

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  ACA Monthly Meeting Wednesday, November 9, 2011 8:00-10:15 am Texas Union Quadrangle Room (3.304) 8:00 Breakfast and Social Time Sponsored by the Study Abroad Office (Thank you!) 8:30 UT Center for Students in Recovery IvanaGrahova and Todd Maison spoke about the UT Center for Students in Recovery (CSR), a resource and community on campus that supportsstudents who are recovering from addictions. Ivana and Todd encourage students to engage in social activities that help strengthen their sobriety and provide a variety of related programs and resources. The CSR program is a division of University Health Services, but their offices are located in the School of Social Work. They offer a variety of 12-step meetings everyday and ask that advisors help make students aware of this resource. Services are confidential, but some students chooseto disclosestories about their addictions and road tosobriety. Some individuals may not want this information shared with others (like a potential employer)andin these situations they are protected with confidentiality by the program. http://www.healthyhorns.utexas.edu/csr/index.html 8:40 ACA Treasury Updates Jay Guevara, ACA Tresurer, reported there is $4,395.00 in the ACA account, as well as$547.52 in savings. There are 220 people who have completed the ACA membership application, but not all have paid dues. Please contact Jay to pay your dues, if you haven’t already. 8:45 Four-year Graduation Rate Survey Results Nathan Vickers, ACA PresidentElect, thanked the ACA membership for their participation in the 4-year graduation rate survey during the busy registration time. He presentedsome of the highlights from the meeting between the ACA executive board and ACA Advisory Council representatives andProvost Steven Leslieand Vice Provost Gretchen Ritter. The group discussed various issues related to four-year graduation rates and some proposals on how improve rates. They discussed implementing mandatory advising,however, it was noted that, in many departments, there would be too many students and too few advisors to facilitate
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  mandatory advising. ProvostLeslie discussed the use of “e-advising” or other tools like MyEDU to lessen the number of students coming in and open up advisors’ time for students in need of more developmental advising. The group also discussed bottlenecks in many high-demand courses during registration. Limited access to certain courses can keep students from progressing in their majorand thereby prolong their stay at UT. The idea of creating consistent looking degree plans across majors wastossed out for debate, as wasemphasizing a four-year graduation plan at freshmen orientation. According to the survey, ACA agrees that students should be allowed to change their major during the course of their academic career. The group discussed trying to start a conversation with students about sticking to a four-year plan as early as possible so that they understand the various policies and requirements for their college and can plan ahead. Nathan reiterated thatseveral people across campus are working to improve the graduation rates, and that ACA’s input has been helpful to those making the decisions. The ultimate goal is to raise the 4-year graduation rates to 71%. Provost Leslie is very interested in and appreciates ACA’s contributions on how to improve student graduation rates. Announcements *The FUNdraising committee invites ACA members to participate in our "Goody Bag" fundraiser! For every $1 donation, we will deliver a Goody Bag to an on- campus person you designate. The money collected will go toward the ACA Student &Professional Scholarship fund. We are also accepting candy donations. Goody Bags will be on sale at our November 9th ACA meeting. *The FUNdraising committee invites ACA members to an American Traditions Potluck on Tuesday, November 15, 2011 from 12:00 – 1:00pm in GSB 5.130. *Professional Development Day will take place Thursday, Feb 9 in the Student Activity Center. The PDD Committee is now accepting proposals! The theme for this year is THRIVE: Transforming, Helping, Resilience, Inspiration, Vision and Education. Please submit your presentation proposals by Dec 16 - https://mccombs.qualtrics.com/SE/?SID=SV_bxTmrlGeUynCMFS *The Awards and Recognitions Committee encourages you to recognize someone you know who does outstanding work by submitting a NACADA advising award nomination. We need your help identifying those individuals and program across campus who deserve to be UT's representatives in the national NACADA awards competition! We're hoping to gather as many nominations as possible this year, and have extended the nomination deadline to December 2nd. *Cynthia Gladstone announced the FLAS Fellowship. She sent a message out with program information to the ACA membership on 11/9/2011. 9:00 Creating Access to Global Education Symposium Put on by the Study Abroad Office