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Harriett Hurt's finest characteristic as an advisor just might be that she knows exactly what her nontraditional students are thinking and feeling.
"I'm the poster child for the adult student experience on this campus," said Hurt, director of adult student services in Continuing Education Credit Programs. "I had plans to go to college just like many other students in my Greenville High School graduating class, but I got married instead. I have lived a number of lives since then. For years I worked as a professional entertainer and singer in nightclubs in the Atlanta area and on the West Coast. I also spent many years regretting that I hadn't gone to college.
"I came to the University as a brand-new freshman in the 1990s with fear and doubt about my abilities as a returning student," she said. "I completed my work in English and adult education. I landed in the Office of Continuing Education Programs as a graduate assistant and started advising non-degree students. As luck would have it, a staff advisor retired and I was able to apply for the position just after I finished my master's degree. Advising students feels so natural and so normal; it feels like what I was meant to do."
There is no doubt that Hurt is a natural: in May, she received the Ada B. Thomas Outstanding Staff Advisor Award.
The nontraditional students Hurt advises are starting a degree program at a later age, or are returning to complete a degree, or must improve their GPA to qualify to get into a program at another institution.
"I still advise non-degree students, including senior citizens taking courses for their own knowledge, and a large number of transient students who live in the area but go to school elsewhere and want to attend classes at Carolina in the summer," Hurt said.
"I also advise students in two baccalaureate programs: one is the Bachelor of Arts in Interdisciplinary Studies (BAIS) program and the other is the Adult Student Advancement Program (ASAP). The ASAP allows adults who might not have a good academic record to go back, do well, and transfer to a degree program. It means a lot to me to be a part of something that offers adult students a second chance."
Adult students face different set of challenges than younger, traditional students.
"Most adults can't take a full course load because they have families and jobs," she said. "The challenge in advising these students is to try to help them track toward graduation while finding classes that will fit their schedules. And also counseling them, because life has a way of intervening."
Recently, Hurt said, an adult student found her graduation was in peril because her elderly mother was very ill and had been admitted to the hospital.
"She called me to say, 'I don't think I can finish. I'm going to have to drop out,'" Hurt said. "My job was to say encourage her, to say 'No, you can do it. You're so close.'" The student graduated on time.
"It is a joy to help other adults do the same thing I did," Hurt said. "The fact that I'm able to tell them what I did has an impact. It really does give me a tool that I would not have had if I had not come to school as an adult myself."
6/07
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Harriett Hurt, adult student services, Continuing Education Credit Programs
