The study described examined the scope of existing services for adult learners enrolled in higher education today. Two analyses were performed, one to review the effect of institutional type on services provided and the second to understand the impact of perceived administrative support on efforts to serve this student population. The implications of the findings for academic advisors are addressed.

Expanding developmental advising through life roles offers the opportunity for advising to realize its potential as a developmental and integrating force in higher education. The author suggests a model for moving into these life roles as well as ideas for academic advisors to use in incorporating leisure and leadership perspectives into their advising.

Intrusive interventions with second semester freshmen on probation is a concept of deliberate intervention in order to enhance student motivation to utilize structured assistant modes. The model is consistent with current research on retention. A three-point theoretical model of intrusive advising is presented and an example of a successful framework used at Old Dominion University is described.

As part of the campus concern with retention, California State University at Long Beach developed several intervention strategies to work with students on academic probation. The Student Affirmative Action Program designed their program components based on an identification of key factors contributing to academic difficulties. Findings suggest that students who participated in this mandatory, long-term, comprehensive program made far more significant and steady progress compared with control populations who utilized other services or who did not participate in any campus program.

This report on major issues facing academic advising summarizes research conducted for NACADA in 1985 and compares the results to those of a similar study completed in 1980.

This summary has been adapted from a report of a NACADA Task Force focusing on the particular issue of advising as a profession. The authors are members of the appointed Task Force which presented its findings to the NACADA membership in October 1987.

The JOURNAL continues its series on the development of academic advising in higher education with the third installment of an interview with Dr. Harvey Wall, who began his career in clinical psychology in the early 1950s. In March 1986, Dr. Wall retired from his position as director of the Division of Undergraduate Studies (DUS), an advising unit at Penn State University that enrolls freshmen and sophomores exploring a variety of majors and advanced students seeking advising assistance with changes in their academic plans. Dr. Wall was the first director of DUS, which started in 1973 with 800 students. It now enrolls 4,000. In many ways Dr. Wall's professional experiences parallel the development of academic advising nationwide. For those new to advising, Dr. Wall's remembrances of things past, although personal and local, should provide powerful insights into the present status and procedures of advising, regardless of location or type of institution. This final interview with Dr. Wall is particularly significant, because he offers readers an extended definition of academic advising and his experienced views on how advising should look to the future.

The author states that most advisors do not have enough information about experiential learning opportunities in their communities to encourage their universities to become involved in offering these opportunities to their students. In this article, the author identifies some successful experiential learning programs, discusses possible Learning outcomes of such programs, and explains the advisor's role in such an activity.

As an advisor, you may have heard one, or both, of these statements: It has been said that 1) anyone can advise; or, more generously, 2) anyone can advise if he/she is given a copy of a university/college catalog. Most advisors know, however, that this is not exactly accurate. In most cases, it isn't even remotely close to the truth. Here, the author shares with us his reactions to what many of us would consider a challenging statement: “All I need is a copy of the catalog to advise my students!”