This session explores how institutions can move beyond isolated initiatives to design sustainable, data-informed student success ecosystems that scale impact. Using UT San Antonio as a case study, the presentation highlights how alignment across academic affairs, student support, learning innovation, and analytics creates coherent pathways that promote student thriving, persistence, and completion. Participants will gain practical insights into using data as infrastructure, strengthening cross-functional collaboration, and building systems that are durable, equitable, and responsive to the full student journey.

The TEXAAN Constitution is getting a refresher! Join us to learn about the proposed updates to the Bylaws of the TEXAAN Constitution. We’ll talk about what they are and why the Constitutional Committee thinks these are important changes for the future of TEXAAN.

Join our dynamic session to witness the powerful partnership between InsideTrack and FosterClub, showcasing an evidence-based model using personalized coaching to directly fuel academic and career success.

The heart of our session is an unforgettable, real-life story of Yesenia and her coach, Anna. Yesenia shares how she navigated juggling full-time work, honors classes, and personal challenges to ultimately earning her Bachelor’s degree, all with Anna’s steady guidance. After hearing her story, we’ll reveal the coaching methodologies that Anna used and demonstrate them as they showcase a live coaching session.

You'll walk away energized and equipped after having the opportunity to ask the duo about their transformative eight-year coaching relationship and the best ways to apply these powerful techniques in your own work.

Academic advisors come from all walks of life, and from a wide variety of backgrounds. Whether you are a millennial who discovered advising by chance, or a Gen Xer with years of advising experience, you have a specific style of advising that you have adopted that works for you and your students. In this interactive presentation we will explore the differences in advising strategies and styles across various generations of advisors, which will culminate into discussions on how these generational approaches can be leveraged to help students of all ages achieve success in their academic careers.

This session will explore how a group advising model can enhance connection, engagement, and persistence among first-time-in-college (FTIC) students. This interactive session will outline how to design and implement group advising clinics that deliver holistic support and foster community among students. Attendees will learn how to leverage higher education CRM tools, such as EAB Navigate, to conduct strategic outreach to specific student populations and structure sessions focused on course planning, degree progress, and connecting students to academic, career, and wellness resources. Presenters will discuss the role of data analytics in understanding and improving student retention and persistence, and share adaptable resources and assessment strategies. Participants will leave with practical tools and ideas to reframe and refresh their advising practices to better support first-year student success and institutional retention goals.

As Texas community colleges adapt to the new outcomes-based funding model under House Bill 8, the role of advising has evolved from course selection to strategic student success planning. This session explores how integrating career exploration and transfer planning within advising conversations can improve persistence, completion, and post-graduation outcomes.

Participants will learn practical strategies for aligning guided pathways with both transfer destinations and career goals, helping students make informed choices that lead to credentials of value and meaningful employment. The session will highlight effective practices such as career-informed degree mapping, collaborative transfer partnerships, and the use of labor market and transfer data to guide advising.

Through case examples and discussion, attendees will gain actionable tools to create a holistic advising model—one that empowers students to see how their educational journey connects to future opportunities. By advising for “what’s next,” institutions can strengthen student engagement, reduce credit loss, and ensure every advising interaction moves students closer to both academic and career success.

This session explores the concept of academic advising as a “performative interaction” with students, discussing the most effective means of educating students on their university experience. Providing an introduction to basic principles of pedagogy, this session will focus on the role of advisors as instructors that take center stage in the quest to helping students make informed decisions for their future.

Over 50% of college students will change their major at least once during their undergraduate experience. Typically, the need for parallel planning arises due to a change of interests and career plans and/or poor performance in a current major. Students can become discouraged and may resist advice to consider other options, but the advisor who’s equipped to help students develop a parallel plan can provide hope and a renewed sense of purpose. This session will provide ideas and strategies for advisors who work with students who need to think beyond their original, cherished dream major and create a viable parallel plan.

Are you looking to build an organized, effective professional development program for academic advisors at your institution? Do your advisors face time and budget limitations? Then this presentation is for you! Come learn how to create, manage, and implement meaningful professional development opportunities using a learning management system. We will even talk about how to easily incorporate artificial intelligence into your programming. The variety of professional development options will appeal to a broad range of advisors, and the reasonable cost will make your administrators happy. Do you already run a professional development program? Come share your insights with the group!

Advising students in architecture, interior design, sustainable urban design, and landscape architecture requires unique strategies that differ from traditional majors. These programs are sequential, studio-based, and accreditation-driven (NAAB, CIDA, NASAD, LAAB). Students face rigorous prerequisite chains, portfolio milestones, heavy time demands, and a demanding studio culture, all of which create persistence and wellness challenges. At the University of Texas at Arlington’s College of Architecture, Planning & Public Affairs (CAPPA), advisors support undergraduates in programs that connect directly to graduate study in architecture and landscape architecture, both STEM-designated fields. CAPPA also offers facilitated admissions for outstanding undergraduates, requiring advisors to guide students through both degree completion and graduate preparation. This session highlights strategies for sequence mapping, milestone tracking, recovery planning, and career/licensure conversations, offering transferable practices for advisors in other accreditation-driven or STEM programs.

This presentation will highlight the phased approach San Jacinto College is taking in its transition from first-come, first-served centralized advising to guided pathway advising, including where we began, where we are in the process of change, and where we hope to be in the future. Participants will have the opportunity to reflect on their own advising models and engage in group discussion about the benefits and challenges of making large-scale change that reframes the culture of advising from reactive service to a proactive, relational practice that promotes student success.

Hospitality is a concept that is popular within the hotel and restaurant industry but is relatively unexplored within academic advising. Hospitality is a way of connecting with consumers to create meaningful and impactful experiences. The framework for this concurrent session is based on the thought-provoking book, Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara (2022). “The remarkable power of giving people more than they expect” (Guidara, 2022) will be discussed as a retention and student persistence tool. Holistic hospitality is a way to achieve positive and meaningful experiences for students. The practical ways advisors can create hospitality in their roles will be discussed. Participants will leave with reimagined possibilities of improving the student experience. Creating a memorable and impactful sense of belonging and mattering is essential for retention and persistence.

The impact of a changing advising landscape: from largely in-person to the inclusion of digital and hybrid advising seems to have left students feeling disconnected, struggling with "advisor permanence"—the understanding that their support system exists reliably even when unseen. This session introduces a low-cost, high-impact strategy called the "Demerit Duck," a physical object given to students to acknowledge and encourage follow-through on uncompleted tasks or meeting preparations. Drawing on the psychological principle of object permanence, the Demerit Duck serves as a tangible reminder of the advising interaction, the advisor's commitment, and the student's responsibilities. Attendees will learn how a small, playful token can bridge the digital divide, transform challenging conversations into moments of authentic connection, and foster greater student accountability and lasting behavioral change beyond an isolated advising interaction.

In an age dominated by digital distractions, advisors face challenges helping students grasp complex academic information. This presentation reimagines advising as a teaching practice by using visual representational aids—posters, diagrams, and graphic organizers—to enhance engagement and understanding. Grounded in research, the session demonstrates how visual tools highlight degree requirements, support diverse learning styles, and transform curriculum review into an interactive experience. Using the pedagogical concept of scaffolding, advisors will learn to break down information into manageable parts through color coding, symbols, and flowcharts. The presentation includes hands-on activities culminating in a collaborative poster-making exercise. Participants will leave with practical strategies and ready-to-use materials to implement learner-centered, visually enriched advising that cultivates academic agency and transforms advisors into teachers in disguise.

The World Health Organization defines burnout in the ICD-11 as “a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed." Burnout is a serious concern for academic advisors, especially as there is a focus on growing enrollment numbers at institutions but not increasing staff, thus leading to higher caseloads. We will review the Maslach Burnout Inventory in order to self-assess risk of burnout, and we will discuss strategies to prevent and/or cope with burnout.