Liberal arts and sciences advising center welcomes new director

Katrina Higgins, the new director of the Academic Services Center in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, sits in her office beneath a still-life painting of fruit on a table. It is vaguely reminiscent of Gauguin, but the shadows cast by the fruit are askew.

The painting tells a story about her job, overseeing academic advising for 12,000 liberal arts and sciences students.

An economics major came to her in May of his senior year because he was missing the art appreciation or art history credit the College requires for graduation.

They scoured the catalog, but nothing was available in the summer to make up the deficiency.

Desperate, he found a studio art course in painting that was offered during the May intersession.

“I was not really happy about it,” says Higgins, who makes the decisions that allow substitutions in required courses in CLAS, “but I said, ‘I’ll do it if you paint me something.’”

She was kidding, but the student wasn’t. He walked in the graduation ceremony, took the painting course to officially complete his degree, and presented her with his oeuvre before heading to a job.

CLAS oversees academic advising for undergraduates enrolled in the College – more than half UConn’s undergraduate population.

Higgins, named director of the Academic Services Center earlier this month, has been an adviser since 2004 and was previously a residence hall director. A native of Australia, she has a Ph.D. in history from the University of Tasmania.

The Center is located in a section of the dean’s office in a brown house at the end of Whitney Road.

There, two to three advisers work with students, faculty, and the registrar’s office to make sure that CLAS students fulfill the requirements of whatever degree course they decide upon – in one of the College’s 40-plus majors or an individualized program.

“Our primary charge is to resolve undergraduate issues,” Higgins says. “If there’s a piece of paper that needs the dean’s signature, we take care of that.”

Sometimes the center’s advisers meet with students who discover at the 11th hour – like the economics major – that their graduation is in jeopardy because they haven’t met all the requirements.

Advisers do their best to help such students, even though, says Higgins, they would prefer to see them the semester before graduation.