Academic Advising Leader Encourages
New Approaches

Kimberly Calvert-Gibson is inspiring her colleagues through her work as a PhD student and an academic advisor at the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science at The University of Texas at Dallas. This past year, she presented research alongside her colleagues in Academic Advising Today, a quarterly electronic publication of NACADA: The Global Community for Academic Advising. She collaborated with Caleb Morris at the University of North Carolina to publish Hermeneutic Advising: Translating Theory to Practice, a review of literature on the subject with implications for practicing academic advisors.

“This is a great example of how advising is evolving into a true profession,” said Dr. Joshua Summers, professor of mechanical engineering and interim associate dean for undergraduate education in the Jonsson School. “Kim’s passion for growth through her graduate work ensures that our students are getting the best, most professional support through the Jonsson School’s office.”

Calvert-Gibson said, “I was honored to have been chosen to present at the annual conference this past year. In addition to pursuing my PhD in leadership and academic advising, I also served as the interim director of advising in the Jonsson School. I absolutely love working with students and advisors, and I have had an incredibly rewarding year professionally.”

Hermeneutic advising is an approach derived from Socratic dialogue as well as Martin Heidegger and Hans-George Gadamer, 20th-century German philosophers. The approach was first described by advisor-scholars Peter Hagen, director of the Center for Academic Advising at the Richard Stockton College of New Jersey, and Sarah Champlin-Scharf, director of academic policy at Harvard University’s Office of Undergraduate Education, and includes eight central concepts: interpretation, or the process of making meaning; connectedness, or recognition of interrelationships; world and time, or the surrounding environment; prejudgment, or biases and preconceptions; the hermeneutic circle, or understanding the relationship between individual parts and the whole; and epistemic humility, or recognition of one’s own limits. These concepts are designed to build stronger reciprocal relationships.

“My colleague and I chose to explore a relatively new approach to academic advising,” Calvert-Gibson said. “Hermeneutic advising asks advisors to form deeper relationships with students and essentially put ourselves in their shoes and examine the world from their point of view.”

Calvert-Gibson joined the Jonsson School after working as an academic advisor at Texas Tech University, and she served as interim director of academic advising for the 2024-25 academic year. In a field where a relatively small number of advisors are serving hundreds of students, Calvert-Gibson says that perspective-taking is essential to fostering good advising relationships. Students may have unique concerns driven by challenging life events such as transferring from a community college or another institution, deciding to change majors or returning to the university following a personal setback.

“Kim is one of many of our advisors who are pursuing advanced degrees, demonstrating their commitment to their profession,” Summers emphasized. “Kim’s scholarship in translating the hermeneutic model of advising into practice with the Jonsson School advising team this past year has been truly transformative. We are lucky to have Kim on the team, and I look forward to her continued professional growth.”

Calvert-Gibson wants to encourage other advisors to immerse themselves in current research on best practices so they can provide even better service to students.

“It is imperative that advisors form relationships with students to further understand what they want and need out of their academic careers and how we as advisors can help them achieve their goals,” Calvert-Gibson said. “My job is also to educate our advisors about new theories and approaches in advising to help them grow professionally while simultaneously providing high quality advising to our students. I truly love my job, and I look forward to many more years of service in higher education.”