Advising Honors Students: Motivational Interviewing as a Tool for Identity Building and Development

Authors

Chelsea McKeirnan, Northern Arizona UniversityFollow

Date of this Version

2023

Document Type

Article

Citation

Chapter 4, pages 73-91

In: Advising for Today's Honors Students, Erin E. Edgington, editor

National Collegiate Honors Council, Lincoln, Nebraska, United States, 2023

Comments

Copyright 2023, National Collegiate Honors Council. Used by permission

Abstract

Section headings:

Advising needs of the honors population

Motivational interviewing

The spirit of motivational interviewing

The four processes of motivational interviewing

Motivational interviewing within an honors advising model

Honors advising and the spirit of motivational interviewing

Honors advising and the four processes of motivational interviewing

Honors advising and the skills of motivational interviewing

Motivational interviewing resources

Conclusion

Arthur W. Chickering and Linda Reisser (1993) noted that “to be effective in educating the whole student, colleges must hire and reinforce staff members who understand what student development looks like and how to foster it” (p. 44). Advising an honors student requires spending more time on the whole student rather than focusing on academics and degree requirements. Advising conversations should ideally involve looking at vocational goals and objectives, identity and self-image outside of academics, connections to the community and larger university, and building autonomy and self-efficacy. These conversations, while necessary, are difficult to have with students and require a great deal of rapport and trust between student and advisor. In addition, trusting relationships take time to build; consequently, it is essential that each advising interaction be meaningful.

Motivational interviewing provides a mindset shift for advising that enables advisors to gain their students’ respect and trust with each meeting. MI provides advisors with four processes for supporting change and growth and for guiding difficult conversations on problematic behaviors such as perfectionism and negative self-efficacy. Finally, it provides a set of four core communication skills that advisors can use during their interactions with students. Implementing the spirit, skills, and processes of MI can help advisors to navigate difficult conversations on stresses related to academic pressures and connection to a community. Although these needs are common within the honors student population, traditional advising models do not address them. Guided by MI, however, academic advisors can meaningfully address problematic areas during an advising session. Most importantly, the changes brought about by MI are enacted by the students, so advisors are never fixing a situation; instead, students are always the agent of positive change. MI represents a deviation from standard advising practice but is flexible enough to allow for nuance and personal style.

Honors advising can often become transactional and focused on a style where advisors provide solutions and answers to students. This directive and retention-focused model fails to empower students to dig deeper into their own autonomy, which is a central need of the honors population (Clark et al., 2018). MI spirit, skills, and processes empower students to be agents of change in their own education and provide a workable advising model for the honors population.