Do you ever have days when all of your colleagues are tense because they feel overworked and underpaid or when the students seem to be asking the same questions over and over and all you want to do is press the “play” button on the tape recorder? The bottom line is that with today's tight fiscal environment we are being asked to do more with fewer resources. What can advisers do to get more help? As an academic adviser in the College of Business and Public Administration (CBPA) at the University of Louisville, I have struggled with this question. One intervention that I am currently designing is a peer advising program. Taking Dr. Jennifer Bloom's graduate course, “Academic Advising in Higher Education,” has been the perfect opportunity to consult the literature and create a plan for hiring, training, and evaluating peer advisers.

The first thing I needed to do was to define peer advising and look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of starting a peer advising program. A common definition of peer advising is “students helping students” (Diambra & Cole-Zakrzewski, 2002, p. 56). My research suggests that there are many institutions that use student advisers to augment their advising services (Goldberg, 1981). Implementing a peer advising program has many advantages. For peer advisers, this leadership opportunity can enhance their resumes and help them to experience firsthand the issues and concerns that their fellow college students and advisers face on a daily basis. These opportunities help us recruit bright, young professionals to the advising profession. Peer advisers can take care of the frequently asked questions that students have, freeing up the professional advisers to take care of complex student issues and problems. They can also interact with students in a wide variety of settings, and students may feel more comfortable talking to one of their peers than to a professional adviser. Peer advisers have firsthand knowledge of the issues and concerns that college students face on a daily basis and have experience dealing with the challenges related to the selection of classes and time management. Peer advising provides yet another mechanism for advisees to engage in a meaningful relationship with a person on campus (Barman & Benson, 1981). Some of the possible disadvantages of peer advising include concerns about student confidentiality and the possibility that peer advisers will provide subjective observations to students rather than to objectively provide information about courses and professors (Habley, 1979). In my estimation, the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages.

College peer mentoring programs are not a new concept. As far back as the nineteenth century, institutions of higher education established programs in which upper-division students took some responsibility as proctors or mentors to first-year students, introducing them to culture, traditions, and responsibilities of citizenship at their new institution. After World War II, informal Big Brothers Big Sisters programs matched upper-division students with first-year students to ease the transition to college life (Carter & McClellan, 2000).

Today, peer advising programs vary in form and intensity from informal programs, which match first-year students using the Big Brothers Big Sisters format, to intensive advising programs facilitated by highly trained professional peer advisers. We have decided to utilize the latter model to meet our students' needs. The first step I took in creating the program was to name the program PAT on the Back. PAT stands for Peer Advising Team. My objective in naming the program was to make students feel welcome and let them know that they will be treated well by the peer advising staff. The next step was to come up with an initial mission statement for the program: “We as the CBPA Peer Advising Team (PAT) are committed to serving as role models for our fellow students and are dedicated to providing undergraduate business students with accurate advising information to help them fulfill their academic and career goals.”

Additional steps in the process will include devising an appropriate peer adviser application and selection process. A number of mechanisms will be used to inform students about this important leadership opportunity. Flyers about the program will be distributed to CBPA students to encourage them to apply for the peer adviser positions. In addition, applications will be posted on the CBPA website and the college message board, and announcements and reminders about deadlines will be distributed via the college's student listserv. Faculty members in each of the units will also be asked to nominate outstanding students for the program. A mandatory informational meeting for interested students will provide information on our expectations of peer advisers. Each candidate for the peer advising positions will be required to submit an application, current resume, transcript, and two letters of recommendation. The application will ask students to state their rationale for applying to the program and explain why they think that they would be a good addition to the advising staff. Minimum qualifications for consideration will be a 2.5 university and college GPA, current enrollment in the college, and at least one semester at the University of Louisville with a minimum of 30 hours of college credit.

The director of the PAT program and the CBPA academic advisers will conduct panel interviews with each finalist. The interviews will be conducted over a period of two to three weeks. Interviewers will carefully consider the candidate's knowledge of the university and CBPA and their answers to interviewers' questions. The interviewers will look for candidates with outstanding listening and communication skills, and the importance of confidentiality will be stressed. The interview panel will rank the applicants, and then the director will contact the top three candidates to offer them peer adviser positions.

The training of these selected advisers will be crucial. The director of the PAT program will be a professional adviser who is charged with supervising the peer advisers. Peer advisers will receive their training from CBPA's six full-time academic advisers who are assigned to the various discipline units in the college. These full-time advisers, who have the greatest knowledge about major and course information, will be accessible at all times. I have found that interactions with advising mentors are influential models of peer adviser training. Other models of peer advising training include having peer advisers enroll in an official academic course during the school year (Campbell, 1997) and having students register in an independent study course (Diambra & Cole-Zakrzewski, 2002). At the beginning of the year, peer advisers will participate in an intensive training program designed to enhance their advising and counseling skills. Each PAT member will receive a peer advising handbook designed by the director. The handbook will contain pertinent policies and procedures, as well as information about courses and majors and office logistical information (e.g., file location, computer, filing system, and e-mail pass codes). Peer advisers will be responsible for updating the handbook on a yearly basis.

The initial plan is that the students will be paid competitive wages for their peer advising work. The peer advisers will sign a contract that spells out the job duties and conditions of employment, as well as the terms of the confidentiality agreement. The specific duties of the peer advisers are as follows:

Peer advisers will provide guidance and advising during established office hours. We will attempt to have peer advisers on duty during a variety of days and times to increase the likelihood that they will be accessible to students. Advising will be available on a walk-in basis. Peer advisers will refer students to full-time professional advisers for final approval regarding curriculum planning. The peer advisers will also participate in a monthly academic advising meeting so that they can voice student concerns about policies and programs. We will strive to let the peer advisers know that they are valued members of the advising staff.

An integral part of establishing any new program is designing effective evaluation tools. At the conclusion of each semester, the director will ask the peer advisers to complete a survey, requesting that they respond to the following items:

The director would also request feedback from the professional advisers:

Students who met with peer advisers will also be surveyed. The director will then compile the survey responses from the peer advisers, professional advisers, and students to capture an overall picture of the effectiveness of the program. Survey results will be used to identify specific ways that the program can be improved in the future.

In conclusion, peer advisers are an excellent potential resource for academic advisers to use in enhancing the advising services available to students. Peer advisers can relate to students on a different level, help students to feel less intimidated, and free up professional advisers to take care of more challenging issues. I look forward to implementing this program and will submit another article that will detail our successes and failures in launching this program.