With spring schedule registration just around the corner, it’s the perfect time to address Binghamton University’s subpar academic advising. I only have experience with Harpur Academic Advising, but considering around two-thirds of undergraduates belong to Harpur College, I assume that my peers face similar frustrations: meeting with an advisor just to be told to refer to online resources or to see another advisor, having to wait weeks to get an appointment with your major’s advisor and re-explaining your situation to every new advisor you meet with. The list feels never-ending.

The advising system not only fails to guide students effectively but also sets them up for unnecessary stress, depriving them of their full potential.

This truth is especially applicable to freshmen, who often enter this unfamiliar territory without guidance. You would think an academic advisor would help you plan your semester based on your major, as the title “advisor” implies, but this is rarely the case. For the first week of my freshman year, I found myself in a calculus class that I absolutely did not need to be in because it was not required for psychology majors. Ironically, another student pointed this out to me, not the advisor I was required to work with to create my schedule.

At times, this poor advice feels deliberate. Most University students arrive with several college credits from high school, and advising appears designed to slow down students with momentum. It sometimes reads as a money grab, encouraging students to take unnecessary classes to reduce early graduation.

In a BU Reddit post advising on graduating early, a user points out that advisors often push to stop students who want to graduate early, saying “classes can fulfill gen-eds and major requirements at the same time” and that its important to “maximiz[e] the amount of requirements one class can do for you.”

“You can meet with Harpur Advising, but they are good for gen-eds only,” the post read. “They also might try to talk you out of [graduating early]. Don’t let them. If you change your mind, let it be because it’s what’s best for you.”

Moreover, advisors push students to get their general education classes out of the way, even though most of these requirements will be naturally fulfilled through major coursework. As a result, students end up wasting their time and money in pointless classes rather than major-related classes.

n addition to Harpur Advising being generally ineffective, its design also minimizes the opportunity for student-advisor relationships. Students are never assigned a specific advisor, so there is never someone familiar with a student’s history or future plans, leaving them to receive repetitive or unhelpful advice from each new advisor they meet. Even if a student finds a helpful advisor, it can be inconvenient to make appointments with them.

When making an appointment online, you cannot request a certain advisor — this can only be done by calling the office. This means that students who may have had a positive experience with a certain advisor may end up meeting with a different advisor who may not be as helpful, having to re-explain themselves and their situation all over again.

I texted some of my friends at other schools to see if they felt the same way about their academic advising, and surprisingly, the situation at BU is not the case everywhere else.

Douglas Hassell, a junior at Northeastern University, told me, “I actually really like my advisor. I’ve had her from the beginning … She’s specific to my concentration — so not only business, but family business. [The advisors] all concentrate on a major.” If a school with about 5,000 more undergraduate students has an advising system that can support its students, Binghamton should be able to as well.

Lindsay Radogna, a junior at the University at Albany, also had a positive advising experience. She explains, “When you come in as a freshman, you have a general advisor. They’re your advisor until you declare a major … I’m a double major, so I have two major advisors, a general advisor, and an honors college advisor.”

These schools have different systems of advising, but both are effective because they allow students to form these critical student-advisor relationships. Whether you have the same advisor throughout college or start with a general advisor and switch to a major advisor, it is essential to always have someone you can easily contact for advice.

Unassigned general advisors just are not logical or efficient. How can someone be qualified to advise both art history and physics majors, especially when they don’t even have the chance to be familiar with the students?

According to the psychology advising scheduler, there is one professional advisor for the approximately 1,000 psychology students at BU enrolled in recent years. Other than this advisor, there are peer advisors who may be useful for first-years, but typically not for upperclassmen, as many of these students are juniors or seniors.

To ensure this issue isn’t unique to the psychology department, I explored two of BU’s other most popular majors, biology and economics. Both had only a handful of advisors for more general inquiries like major requirements and declaring your major. However, there are only one economics and two biology advisors available for deeper questions on topics like upper-level classes, research opportunities and career planning.

The University has become an increasingly appealing and reputable school in recent years, and it doesn’t let us forget with its constant promotion as a “public Ivy” or a Forbes Top 25 Public College. If BU is such a competitive school, our strong students need student resources that can keep up with them. I know I’m not the only one who feels like I could have been further ahead in my major if I had the appropriate guidance early in my academic career.

University students strive for success and are passionate about their futures. They deserve an advising system that reflects these ambitions.

Riley Lavrovsky is a junior majoring in psychology.

Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.