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Best advisory ever: A How-To & How-Not

HowTo: Have a good advisory

  • Eat. Stop at the store. Pick up some donuts, mini-muffins, and assorted fruit. Advisory isn't a fun place for students. Make it more inviting. Bribery through food is a good start.
  • Apologize. Mainly apologize for using the "curriculum" you're supposed to be using. Be honest. Tell them you were trying to the the right thing, but some times the "right thing" isn't what's right.
  • Talk. This is big. At this point students will most complain about how stupid advisory is and how it could be used for so many more useful things. Complaining is good
  • Share. Show a couple video clips you particularly like. Show a couple video clips students like.
  • Enjoy. The first advisory meeting you've had all year that wasn't forced or awkward.

Advisory (a.k.a. mentor/mentee, homeroom, seminar, etc.) is designed to be a time where students meet with a teacher to form a relationship outside of the traditional teacher/student interactions. Teachers meet with the same group of students for all four years of high school with the expectation that deeper and more lasting relationships will be formed between students and teacher. I believe that a well executed advisory can be a positive influence on school culture and student success. However, our system is broken.

In a nutshell, here are the major problems:

  • We meet with our advisories every two weeks for 30 minutes. This isn't enough to form lasting relationships.
  • Activities and "curriculum" used for advisory are developed on an "as-we-go" basis.  There just isn't time to develop this stuff on the fly.
  • A small, under-attended, over-stressed committee of five or six individuals designs the "curriculum" that is used for advisory. Six simply isn't enough people to tackle this monumental task.
  • All levels use the same "curriculum" materials. All grade levels- and especially freshman and senior levels- should have their own goals and activities.

Today, I quit. I stopped using the materials provided. I stopped using any formal materials. I couldn't put my students or myself through that uncomfortable hell of pushing through an activity that neither of us thinks is appropriate or helpful.

If you had been visited my classroom during this time you wouldn't have been blown away by anything that happened. If you had been in my classroom for every other advisory to see the awkward and forced interactions that used to be the norm you'd understand my enthusiasm more clearly.

As educators we want so much for advisory to be valuable that we forget the most valuable part is just getting to know our students. You don't need a formal curriculum for that. You just need time and desire (a few donuts don't hurt either).

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I need your help!

I need your help.

The background

Each teacher at my school is assigned what they call a mentor/mentee group. It's generally the same idea as an Advisory, Forum, Seminar, etc. that many schools are doing nowadays. We meet every other week for 30 minutes.

The first meeting was essentially to fill out paperwork. The second and third meetings students completed a survey (which took 10 minutes max) of what they'd like to see mentor/mentee become. Needless to say, my jaded group of seniors could pretty much see exactly what I could: No one (including staff) really knew what it was supposed to be about. I certainly hadn't been briefed on the goals of the program or the purpose behind its inception.

What I did know is that my attendance rate was about 75%, that we were supposed to do more than shoot the breeze, that we don't actually get plans for what we're supposed to be doing each meeting until the night before (or morning of), and that I didn't know diddly about diddly about how things worked at this school.

What to do?

Fed up and frustrated after our third meeting, I asked my vice-principal (who is in charge of the mentor/mentee committee) about the broad goals of mentor/mentee. He answered pretty much the way I expected: (1) to ensure a positive relationship between teachers and students outside the academic environment, and (2) to use as a forum for disseminating information.

Instead of simply going off the reservation and planning my activities, I decided to attend the next planning meeting and share some of my thoughts. I didn't simply want to become that teacher that poo-poo's everything and just goes off and does whatever they want. I wanted to help improve the program.

The meeting

6:50am. 1st floor conference room. Early. This morning. The meeting went fine, I don't think I did a great job of sharing my views. They were in the middle of going over some of the student survey results, so I didn't want to just totally jump in and sidetrack the meeting.

It became clear that as a school we're still trying to hash out exactly where and how this mentor/mentee program fits. Most of the discussion at the meeting was long term, which wasn't what I expected. I was expecting discussion about planning the next session.

The next step

I decided to send out an email to the committee members sharing my concern over the lack of relationship building activities being provided, and then sent them a link to my school wiki where I brainstormed a list potential ideas (many skimmed off the ideas of others- thanks!). This seemed relatively well received, though it's by no means a fix to the situation.

Where I need help

Many of you may teach in schools that have advisories, forum, seminar, or whatever else. What activities (both in your classroom and school wide) have you done that were successful?

I'm going off the reservation next time around. I'm just hoping to take the rest of the school with me. 😉