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ABSTRACT
International student advisors are responsible for a myriad of functions ranging from student arrival services, orientation to the academic norms, communicating cultural information and academic expectations, to ensuring that international students are familiar with the pertinent institutional and governmental policies. This paper provides a systematically conducted literature review in the field of international student advising regarding shifting roles of advisors, issues and challenges in the profession, needs of international students, and recommendations for those in the profession.
INTRODUCTION
International student advisors are vital to the overall welfare of international students at institutions of American higher education. International student advisors provide information, programing, and services to students and scholars who come to study or work in the United States. International student advisors work not only with the diverse g-oup of individuals called "foreign" or "international students," but also with American students, faculty, and staff, with citizens of the local community, with officials of U.S. and foreign government agencies, and with a variety of agencies that sponsor foreign students and scholars both within and outside the U.S. (International student advising, 2011). These roles and the definition of international student advisor have not changed much since the early 1970s:
Foreign student advisor is a person officially designated or appointed...for advising foreign students and for coordinating special series offered foreign students. The actual title for the advisor may vary; i.e. foreign student counselor, Dean of Foreign students. ...In some institutions the advisor may work alone while in other others he [she] may have a professional staff. All of the professional staff of an Office of Foreign Student Affairs may be considered foreign student advisors since this allows for inter-university comparison (Williams, 1974, p. 14).
The diverse backgrounds of students demand that international student advisors be responsible for a myriad of functions ranging from student arrival services and orientation to the academic norms, to ensuring that international students are familiar with the pertinent institutional and governmental policies in colleges and universities. Advisors help acclimate international students to the new culture in the new land. Language difficulties of international students, housing, culture shock, and familiarity with teaching methods are some urgent issues that the foreign student advisors must mitigate at colleges and universities (Austell, 2013; Bu, 2003; Curtin,...