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Chapter Advisors

Responsibilities

The chapter advisor is the link between the national organization of and the student members, and between the chapter and its home institution. All mailings from the National Office go to the advisor; he or she is responsible for seeing that the chapter's student officers and others connected to the chapter's activities get the information they need. The advisor is key to the success of the chapter and the level of benefit students are able to derive from membership in it. While the more active a chapter is the more will be required of its advisor, it is also true that the most successful chapters give a great deal of administrative responsibility to their student officers, leaving the advisor with mostly only oversight duties and, of course, final authority in chapter matters.

Sometimes the department chair is the  chapter advisor; sometimes a junior faculty member is asked to take on the job. In any case it is important that the advisor be a member of the faculty who is dedicated to the needs of students, has good rapport with undergraduates, and is willing to perform the duties of advisor when and as they come up.

Following is a list of areas for which the chapter advisor is ultimately responsible; how much time he or she needs to spend on each will vary with the chapter's activity level, the requirements of the home institution, and how the tasks are shared between the advisor and the student officers.

• Communication. The advisor needs to share communications from the National Office with the student officers, department secretary, and any others involved with the chapter, and to take responsibility for communications between the chapter and the home institution when necessary. He or she should be sure that students are made aware of PSA (the student information cards help with this) and its programs and opportunities (Chapter Activity Grants competition, student paper awards, scholarships, etc.) and their deadlines, as well as administrative information bearing on the chapter such as fee increases, new office procedures, the availability of new merchandise, etc. For early and automatic notification of all National Office programs, deadlines, and other important information, Chapter Advisors should make sure they are signed on to the Chapter Advisor's E-mail Network. To subscribe, send an e-mail message to the National office with your full name, institution, and email address, and a request to be added to the Network.

• Credentials, Authorizations, etc. The advisor is ultimately responsible for verifying the eligibility of  candidates and for signing the Membership Certificate Request Forms which are the official notification to the National Office of the names of new chapter members. The advisor should also be sure the chapter submits an Annual Report to the National Office.

• Grants and Awards. The advisor must sign the cover letter for any proposal a chapter submits to the Chapter Activity Grants competition, and should advise student officers on the content of the proposal and its budget. The advisor is also responsible for nominating a student for the Graduate Scholarship, and for the Undergraduate and Graduate Student Best Paper Awards.

• Finances. The chapter advisor has ultimate fiduciary responsibility for the chapter, even if student officers take care of the day-to-day details of collecting fees, banking and paying bills. The advisor must be aware of how much, if any, money is being collected from students in the chapter's name, and how the money is being spent and on what. If there is a chapter checking account the advisor should look over its records frequently. If the chapter needs a check requisitioned from the university accounting department the advisor should take care to shepherd the request through the system in a timely way. (See also, Handling Chapter Finances.)

• Meetings and speakers. In most situations student members, no matter how energetic and ambitious, will need some help in setting up speakers or other special events for meetings. The advisor should be available to do whatever is needed to help students carry out good plans, for instance by suggesting other faculty or local luminaries who might be good speakers for a meeting, signing letters of invitation to these people, advising students on meeting arrangements and advertising, and generally giving them the benefit of his or her experience and position to see that their programs come off well.

• Guidance. The chapter advisor should be involved with the student officers as they write their chapter's bylaws, decide on a meeting schedule and set up business meetings, and make other plans for chapter activities.

• Archiving. The advisor should also provide a home for chapter records, even if this involves only labeling a shelf or file drawer "PSA" and making sure the materials are always there and available for whoever needs them.

Benefits

• Biennial Business Meeting. The chapter advisors represent the membership of PSA at its biennial business meeting where the new officers and Council members are elected. The Business Meeting is held in even-numbered years in conjunction with the APSA convention. Advisors are notified of the details in plenty of time so that, if they are attending the APSA Convention, they can plan to come to the PSA Business Meeting. Refreshments are served at the Business Meeting and PSA has in the past paid a modest travel stipend to advisors who attend it. The notice of the meeting includes information about the stipend.

• Best Chapter Advisor Awards. Because the work of Pi Sigma Alpha's many dedicated chapter advisors is sometimes unrecognized by the department or university, an annual Best Chapter Advisor Award was established in 1995. As of 1996 up to three Best Chapter Advisors may be named each year. The awards are intended to express the appreciation the leadership of Pi Sigma Alpha feels for the role of chapter advisor when it is carried to the highest level. Each award includes a cash award of $1,000, a letter of commendation to the advisor's university president, and recognition at the APSA Annual Meeting and in the PSA Newsletter. Chapter advisors of at least five years' service are eligible for the award. Nominations are made by the department chair or dean in a letter to the National Office detailing the advisor's contributions to the chapter over his or her term as chapter advisor. Nominations are due by June 1, and the award winners are announced by July 15.

Beyond these tangible benefits are the more subtle but even richer rewards inherent in mentoring students of special distinction. The Chapter Advisor has the opportunity to relate in an extraordinary way to the brightest, most motivated political science students, guiding them in the development of organizational skills not covered in their academic courses, exposing them to a wide range of speakers from outside the university community, providing them with the recognition they deserve for high academic achievement and perhaps the incentive to pursue further study in political science.