[kyleamazza]

Not that I disagree, but I had the opportunity to have both cases, each at separate schools. Having a (capable) full-time adviser meant that they were well-versed in the requirements of the program, as well as how to navigate administrative side of things, such as adding classes even if you don't fill the prereqs, etc.

With a faculty member, I found that they were more focused on their actual faculty/teaching duties, and had trouble with the more administrative side of things.

This is also probably dependent on the quality of the school

[impendia]

I'm a math professor, asked to serve as an advisor frequently. I typically advise math majors -- and I do a fairly good job of it. Although I tend to have difficulty with the administrative side of things, especially since our degree requirements are a moving target.

That said, our faculty used to advise incoming students as well. From what I understand, our undergraduate director (tenured faculty) would do all the advisement personally, during the summer, himself. One summer he was out of town a lot and asked me to fill in for him for a day.

I was not very happy to be asked to show up during the summer. For one thing, typically faculty are paid only during the academic year, unless it's from grants (although I happened to be getting summer salary that year).

But also, the advisees were mostly freshman who weren't ready to take math-major courses yet. They wanted general advice on how to navigate the system, which gen-ed requirements to get out of the way, whether to take "University 101", and the like. Although I did my best, I felt quite out of my element.