On Oct. 3, members of the Mississippi State University Robert Holland Faculty Senate passionately expressed concerns as administrators presented a complete remodel of the student advising process. The changes to advising, set to be implemented beginning in January 2026, come as MSU attempts to increase its retention and graduation rates, which are currently the lowest in the Southeastern Conference.

While MSU’s closest peer institution, the University of Mississippi, is less selective in its admissions, accepting 97% of applicants in the fall of 2023, its 88% retention rate outpaces MSU’s 83%, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. This data quantifies the problem that the new advising model is meant to solve.

Tabor Mullen, the interim associate vice president for strategic partnerships at MSU, said at the meeting that these rankings indicate that changes to advising must be made.

“We have fallen behind our peers in that we are an inflection point in higher education where the status quo is simply not acceptable,” Mullen said.

Two-phase advising model

The model, which splits advising into two phases, is set to be implemented for five MSU colleges in January 2026, with the rest following in July 2026.

Under this model, professional academic advisors (PAAs) will be embedded into each department to advise freshmen and sophomores. These full-time advisors, under the supervision of the Center for Advising, will have a target caseload of between 200 and 250 students and will be trained to recognize and address issues that may cause students to drop out.

Mullen emphasized the importance of identifying student needs early.

“We have to engage our students when their troubles are ankle deep, not neck deep,” Mullen said.

Once students complete roughly 60 credit hours, or between four and five semesters of coursework, they will be transferred to faculty advisors from the college or department aligned with their discipline who can provide more long-term, major-specific guidance to students.  This is a departure from MSU’s current advising model, in which faculty advisors advise students throughout their entire time at MSU.

Mullen said that this model stems from the 2020 Student Success Task Force recommendation calling for “effective and consistent advising experiences” for every student.

Faculty involvement

Members of the faculty senate expressed concerns that they were not consulted enough during the formation of the new system.

Mullen said that he has met with department heads and deans in the ongoing development of individual memorandums of understanding for each department and that he has listened to faculty requests communicated to him through this leadership since the draft model was developed during a Dean’s Retreat in February.

However, Faculty Senator Matthew Priddy, a professor in the Advanced Composites Institute, claimed that the formation of the system was “top-down” and that it went against the faculty handbook, which says that faculty should be involved in the creation of university policies.

“The department heads and deans are not faculty. This is a top-down approach that is happening, and the handbook clearly states that it’s meant to be bottom up,” Priddy said.

‘One size fits all’ concerns

Other senators expressed concerns that PPAs will not be able to meet the unique needs of each department.

Faculty Senator Alexis Gregory, an associate professor in the College of Architecture, Art and Design, noted that because the Bachelor of Architecture program has higher requirements for entry, the retention rate is higher than in other programs.

“And so the concern is that for a program that is successful, that is so specialized…it is not going to meet the needs of our students,” Gregory said.

Shaw responded by saying that while there will be a standardized overall policy for advising within the university, the advisors will not be part of a centralized one-size-fits-all system. Instead, they will be embedded in their assigned departments so that they can focus on and learn the needs of those students.

“They’re going to be people that you know and work with every day, so that in fact, they have the opportunity to really understand what it takes to be a major in your department,” Shaw said.

Shaw also said that the implementation of the changes will be evolutionary and that it will continue to be adapted and developed for each department based on feedback.

Some faculty members questioned whether poor advising is a primary cause of MSU’s retention problem.

Faculty Senator James Chamberlain, an associate professor of political science, noted the economic challenges faced by some students in Mississippi.

“I wonder how much of our retention and graduation percentage being lower than other institutions has to do with the economic background of our students,” Chamberlain said. “And that’s not to say we shouldn’t change the advising model at all, but it does make me wonder if we’re putting too much store in the ability of advising to really make a difference for that.”

Shaw argued that economic hardship in Mississippi should further motivate efforts to improve advising and retention. Shaw also noted that the economic burden on students is only increased by their incurring debts for a degree they do not complete.

“That’s why I’m very passionate about this,” Shaw said. “Because I think we have a very personal and moral responsibility to these students that we are seeing drop out.”

Implementation

Despite the concerns raised by faculty on Oct. 3, the new advising model is set to be implemented for five colleges starting in January 2026, with the rest following in July.