Leaders' Perceptions of the Professionalization of Academic Advising: A Phenomenography

Through the professionalization process, an occupation transforms into a profession. Although much scholarship has situated academic advising as a professional endeavor, in the past few years, the authors of two papers posited that advising is not a profession, a contention not shared by all within the advising community. Despite much scholarly deliberation, advising and the role of it in higher education remains misunderstood by administrators, faculty members, staff, students, and some advisors themselves. Therefore, discussions of professionalizing the field remain both inevitable and imperative. To advance the dialogue, a phenomenography was used to explore the variety of perspectives that NACADA leaders shared about the professionalization of academic advising. Five attitudinal categories emerged: assumptive, presumptive, emerging profession, inferiority complex, and the need for further definition.