Advisor Spotlight: Bobbi Knickerbocker, 2009-2010 UF Advisor of the Year

by Ella Tabares

Bobbie Knickerbocker, 2009-2010 UF Advisor of the Year

Congratulations to Bobbi Knickerbocker for being named the 2009-2010 UF Advisor of the Year! Bobbi has served as an academic advisor in the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences for over two years. In addition to serving as a pre-health advisor, she also advises biology students. Her past experiences in the nursing and counseling fields have provided her with a great framework from which to advise students, and her co-workers are grateful to have her on their team.

What advising activities take up most of your time? (i.e., What’s a ‘typical day’ like for you?)
Seeing biology majors and pre-health students consume a good portion of my day either via walk-ins or appointments, student e-mails, workshops, or other administrative duties.

What do you like most/least about your job?
I like advising students the most; there’s nothing about my job that I don’t enjoy!

What’s the best thing a student ever told you?
Students tell us so many things whether in a personal advising session or through other mediums. I place great value on the fact that students feel they are able to trust me with their personal stories. Along with other advisors, I read numerous personal statements for applications to professional graduate programs. In these, students share very personal information. Their ability to trust me with this information says a great deal. This is the best.

What did it mean to you to be named UF’s Advisor of the Year?
This was an incredible surprise and honor. For me, the greatest impact of this was a nomination made by a student. It means a great deal to know I had a positive impact on a student at UF. It is my hope and intention to be a positive presence for students even when the information I sometimes have to deliver is negative. I hope to project a desire to empower and support students in their goals and abilities and perhaps this reinforces that, for one student, this was successful.

What advice would you give a brand new advisor at UF?
Be patient with yourself and be open to the many ways and mechanisms you can grow as an advisor. Reflect to your students the personal qualities you wish your students to develop.

What advice do you give a brand new student at UF?
There are many changes you will encounter as a student here. These include both academic and personal changes and transitions. Breathe, think about the choices you are making so you understand the consequences, and use the numerous resources at your disposal. UF has so many resources for students, there is no reason to feel alone in this process or to make uninformed decisions.

Favorite TV show?
The Good Wife

What do you enjoy doing away from work?
Playing with grandkids, motorcycling, travel, cooking, gardening, and animals.

Husband/wife/partner? Kids? Dogs? Cats? Others?
Don (husband), Jen & JC with Liam and Livy, Chris & Mick with Quin, Toby (dog), Slip & Tux (cats)

What’s your secret for balancing your work and home lives?
Being an extreme introvert, I need quiet or what I call “cave time.” Also, I try to maintain healthy eating habits and a healthy lifestyle. Friends also help keep me balanced.

New Feature: Course Announcements & Updates

 The UF Advisor is now helping advisors stay abreast of the latest courses offered at UF! (Click on orange course numbers to view additional details.)

HSC 4950 Nutrition and Health for Personal Fitness

This course is designed for non-health education undergraduate majors who are interested in learning healthy eating habits, developing a personal fitness program, maintaining a healthy weight, eating healthy on a limited budget, and developing a healthy lifestyle into adulthood.

JOU 4930 (Section 4293) Sports Media & Society
Watch sports. Talk about sports. Learn about the relationship between sports and media. Ideal for freshmen and sophomores.

PCB 1051 Exploring Your Genome (Web-based)
Personal genomics is an emerging field, and it will soon be affordable to obtain the sequence of an individual's own genome. This course will discuss the field of genomics, how genome sequence data is obtained and analyzed, and most importantly, what can be learned from an individual's genome. How does the analysis of one's own genes affect health care, diet, exercise and other health decisions? The course will also include related topics such as disease gene mapping, epigenetics, and the microbiome. Intended for freshmen through senior non-science majors.

PKG 3010 Packaging, Society and the Environment (Web-based)
Packaging is a global multi-billion dollar industry that impacts society on a daily basis. This course considers the impact of packaging and how it reflects upon society. The course covers the history of packaging, sustainability, global packaging, and considers the future role packaging will play in our global society. Because packaging integrates issues in a wide range of fields, the on-line discussion will be enriched by students from a variety of majors who bring their own perspective on packaging issues.

New Instructor for PLP 2060 Mold, Mildew, and Mushrooms
This lecture/demonstration course deals with fungi and human affairs. Students will examine the detrimental and beneficial aspects of fungi, including their use in the manufacture of medicines, foods, beverages, growth hormones, and the consumption of mushrooms for food and recreational purposes. On the dark side we will see that fungi are involved in the destruction of wood and wood products, fabrics, fruits, vegetables, grains, and all sorts of food products.  Intended for freshmen through senior non-science majors.

Florida Alternative Breaks: Lasting Learning Experiences through Service Immersion

by Jill Lingard & Maureen Cox

We shaped and painted PVC piping under the direction of Mayan guides while the shrill calls of howler monkeys echoed throughout a lush rainforest canopy.

Every woman in the village stood in the circle thanking us in their native Mayan tongue for our stove-building and then gave us each a brightly-colored cloth they had hand-woven and filled with flowers.

Both of the word pictures painted above describe international travel experiences from recent Florida Alternative Breaks trips. In both cases, academic advisors earned the privilege to accompany 14 UF students on a week of volunteer work and self discovery in a foreign country.

Florida Alternative Breaks (FAB) is a student-run service organization that is based in the Center for Leadership and Service in UF’s Division of Student Affairs. The group organizes themed community service trips during academic breaks throughout the year to areas within the US and internationally. Shorter trips span 3-day weekends (like the MLK holiday weekend in January); longer trips last a week (like over spring break).

Each FAB trip focuses on a social or environmental issue, and service learning activities are intentionally designed to immerse students in those issues firsthand. The rainforest scene described above came as part of a 2009 water conservation themed trip to the interior of Belize (above photo). Two teams of students on that trip constructed a grey water system and a solar water heater for a conservation and research station. The second scene comes from a 2010 trip to the Mayan Highlands of Guatemala, where the group’s focus was on poverty and development. Students broke into groups of 3-4 to build stoves for indigenous families in two small villages. The main lesson for the group was understanding the day-to-day realities of poverty and how empowering a community to make small changes can make big differences. Issues addressed on previous FAB trips have also included animal welfare, immigration law, homelessness, disaster recovery, HIV/AIDS, children’s issues, community health, marine life protection, and mental health.

Each FAB trip has two student site leaders, who undergo intensive training as they learn to organize virtually every aspect of their assigned trips. The site leaders really “own” their trips—they make all travel arrangements, find and secure housing accommodations, research their assigned issue, choose related volunteer agencies to work with, collaborate with agency personnel on specific service learning activities, and design meaningful reflections before, during, and after the trip to maximize students’ growth and learning about the social issue they’re immersed in, the culture impacted by it, and themselves.

Each year, three spring break FAB groups travel to international destinations, usually in the Caribbean or Central America. The international trips include a trip advisor, who is a UF faculty or staff member. The advisor’s travel expenses are paid for and their purpose is to provide support to students before, during, and after the trip—especially to the site leaders (as their focus is on taking care of everyone and everything else). If/when travel or other emergencies arise, it’s also helpful to have an adult advisor on hand to help students problem-solve. Advisor applications are usually due in October, with interviews and selection taking place in November.

As academic advisors, we probably all feel pretty lucky to work with the caliber of student UF attracts. Think about the kind of students who would choose meaningful service over leisure during one of their breaks from school. These are students who are eager to connect with the world at a level beyond classrooms and textbooks. They’re passionate about issues and want to play an active role in understanding and solving them. It’s not unusual to hear student participants report that they discovered their ‘life’s work’ on a FAB trip. A week spent with students like this leaves you with a serious infusion of hope for the future of our planet!

For more information on FAB trips and the application process for student participants and advisors, visit the FAB website. The authors of this article would also be delighted to field questions about their experiences.

2010 Common Reading Program Selection: The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind

by Jill Lingard

This year’s Common Reading Program selection is The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba. The book chronicles the inspiring story of Kamkwamba as he designs and builds his own windmill to generate electricity for his home in Malawi. Using rummaged mechanical parts from a nearby dump and diagrams from decades-old textbooks, he perseveres through ridicule from villagers and a devastating famine to power more than light bulbs. Kamkwamba brings hope and imagination to his family, his village, and now to the world through his story.

The Common Reading Program is designed to provide all first-year students with a common intellectual experience to stimulate discussion, critical thinking, and encourage a sense of community among students, faculty and staff. Each year, the book is chosen by a committee comprised of faculty, staff, and students who are charged with selecting a book that is interdisciplinary, global, recently published, and relevant to both first-year students and the UF community.

The Dean of Students Office has posted information about the book and related resources on the Common Reading Program website. Last fall, Kamkwamba was interviewed by The Daily Show’s host Jon Stewart. An 8-minute video clip of the interview is posted on the DSO’s site and should provide an entertaining ‘hook’ to encourage students to read the book. DSO staff will continue to update their site throughout the summer with discussion guides, class activity ideas, and campus events related to the book during Summer B and Fall terms. Similar to last year, the author will address all first-year students at convocation in the O’Connell Center on August 20.

School of Business advisors are holding their annual book club during the Summer A session to read the book as a group and discuss how it might be woven through their Warrington First-Year Experience classes. They welcome campus-wide instructors of First Year Florida to join them on Fridays from 8:15-9:15 a.m. in 232 Bryan Hall. Here is our reading schedule:

May 21: Pages 1-61

May 28: Pages 62-113

June 4: Pages 114-167

June 11: Pages 168-210

June 18: Pages 211-270 

Readers can choose to attend one, some, or all of the meetings. There will be no pop quizzes. Coffee, breakfast snacks, and engaging dialogue will be served!

The Quick Q & A with Ann Ho Becks

by Robin Rossie

After seven years of very long days (and even longer nights) overseeing New Student Programs in the Dean of Students Office, Ann Ho Becks is leaving UF in June to pursue her dream of becoming a professional Elvis impersonator in Barcelona, Spain. Okay, so I made that last part up, but you may find a surprise or two in her responses to “The Quick Q & A.”

What is your favorite word?
Horripilations

What is your least favorite word?

Oh, that one is not suitable for print. ;)

What inspires/motivates you?

Seeing people see and reach their own potential.

What is your pet peeve?

People who don’t use their turn signals.

What scent, taste, or sound will always remind you of UF fondly?

Carillon bells.

What scent, taste, or sound will always remind you of UF not-so-fondly?

Smell of grease traps being cleaned (like when they have Preview over at the Racquet Club).

What is your 10-year plan?

Graduate from Maryland with my PhD, get a job as an institutional researcher (preferably for a student affairs division) or faculty member in a higher education/college student personnel graduate program, buy a sailboat, and move “home” to San Diego, CA (the latter three not necessarily in that order).

What title do you want to hold before you retire?

Best Aunt Ever. But seriously, if we’re talking about work life, I’m not a big “title” person; what is more important to me is leaving this place better than I found it, and making a difference in people’s lives.

If you could do so anonymously, what graffiti would you most like to spray paint, and where?

“Knowledge is power. Use your vote to increase K-12 funding!” on one overpass in every major city and every major interstate in our country.

If the UF New Student Programs office had a genie in a bottle, what three Preview enhancements would they wish for?

There are so many things I can think of but I’d start with competitive pay for orientation leaders as compared to other institutions across the state and country.

Would you send your kid to UF as a freshman? Why or why not?

Yes, if the school was a good fit for what they were looking for in a college experience.

Ann, I speak for many others as well as myself when I say you were a good fit for UF. We thank you for the opportunity to work with you, and wish you continued success!

Kep’s Korner

by Glenn Kepic

In Making the Most of College, Richard Light wrote "Good advising may be the single most underestimated characteristic of a successful college experience." As professional advisors, it’s not just our job to develop and deliver advising programs to help our students succeed, but also to contribute to the field of advising and be visible to the entire campus community. I hope the activities highlighted below serve as an important reminder of the meaningful and successful work we are doing on campus and in the field of academic advising. All members of the UF advising community should be proud of the national reputation we have earned as one of the premier advising operations in the country. I encourage each of you to continue your important work with students and to get involved with our national association, NACADA.
 
• For the third time since 2002, academic advisors from UF were awarded the coveted “Best of Region” award for the very best presentation given at the Region 4 NACADA conference held at Georgia Tech in late March. This is quite an accomplishment considering no other school in our region has won the award more than once since it was created. Lindsey Dedow and Robbie Shields presented on the School of Business Peer Mentoring Program “Get Ready To Work! The Development and Implementation of a Career Focused Peer Mentor Program.” In recognition of their outstanding presentation, Lindsey and Robbie will receive financial assistance to attend and present their session at the Annual Conference in the fall. Congratulations Lindsey and Robbie!

Previous UF recipients of the Best of Region award were Glenn Kepic and Brian Cullaty (CLAS) for “Parents – Friend of Foe?” in 2005 and Megan Silbert, Joe Rojo, Christine Richmond (CBA) for “Demographic Defenses: The Need for Quantitative Data Collection and Evaluation in an Economy of Limited Resources” in 2002.

• Congratulations are also in order for AAC Graduate Assistant, Kelly Bailey who was awarded a Graduate Student Scholarship to attend the regional conference.

• Associate Dean of CLAS, Albert Matheny, reports that Dean Paul D’Anieri just returned from an SEC Deans of Arts and Sciences meeting, and the consensus at that meeting was that UF has the best advising system in the SEC.

Remember, an easy way to stay connected and involved in the campus advising community is to attend the UAC and their professional development events. Keep up the great work!

Professional Development Workshop: An Advisor Looks at 40

by Kari Ward
 
On May 3rd, the UAC’s Professional Development Committee hosted a workshop entitled “An Advisor Looks at 40.” Andrew Wehle, an advisor in the College of Design, Construction, and Planning, gave the presentation.

The focus of the presentation was the future of the academic advising profession. The conversation covered professional identity issues (are we faculty or staff?), whether administrators and faculty are aware of the services we provide, and how advisors need to play an active role in developing their profession. In his presentation, Andrew pointed out that advisors usually have opportunity for horizontal growth—activities that allow us to increase our professional skills sets like attending NACADA conference workshops, participation on university committees, and teaching First Year Florida--but have little opportunity for vertical growth, or “opportunities for advisors to gain stature within a professional framework or hierarchy.” He added that “the professional ‘carrot’ utilized by most professions to encourage and reward superior effort, performance, and achievement” is largely absent from the advising profession.

Andrew made no pretense of having answers to the questions he posed, but hoped to serve as a catalyst for conversation on this matter. To view a copy of the slides for Andrew’s presentation, click here.

Ask an Advisor

by Kari Ward

Our “Ask an Advisor” column allows UF advisors to share their viewpoint and experiences. I recently asked some advisors to answer the following question: “What’s your dream vacation?”

My dream vacation consists of clear water, blue skies, fresh seafood, 87 degree temperatures and all expenses paid. Anywhere exotic like Honduras, Tanzania, or Grenada will do! Katrice Crawford, School of Business

My dream vacation would be taking off a summer to visit the National Parks of Colorado, Utah, Arizona and New Mexico. My family and I are big fans of the National Parks; we hope to visit them all someday!
John Denny, Honors Program Office

So many dream vacations to choose from . . . I love the idea of themed vacations like a tour of Georgian-era London: horseback riding along the Serpentine and Rotten Row in Hyde Park, shopping on Bond Street, visiting Bow Street, Covent Gardens, and Fenchurch Street (site of a former East India Company building), seeing an opera at the Royal Opera House and the Elgin Marbles at the British Museum, and walking St. James and Mayfair. Or, touring Alhambra palace (Granada, Spain) and 16th c. English Protestant Reformation sites (I’d love to hear Catherine Howard’s ghost at Hampton Court). Cynthia Sain, Chemical Engineering

Well, there are a lot of places in the world that I would like to see so I think a cruise might work out well. I would take the world cruise on the Queen Mary II. There are a couple that last about 100 days. That should make for a nice getaway.” Kevin Austin, Fine Arts

Advisor Tool Box

State of Florida General Records Schedules Ever wonder how long you have to retain student records, including advising-related e-mails? Also, see Electronic Records and Records Management Practices for basic information on record management.

CHOMP (Career Help fOr Major Planning)
The Career Resource Center has a new interactive tool to help students choose their major.


UF Guide for Parents of Undergraduates

Do you advise prospective students and their parents? If so, this polished, interactive publication can serve as useful reference for them. The guide offers tips on high school planning and information on all aspects of the admission process, including our freshman profile, costs of attendance, and campus life.