An academic advisor at Rowan University in Glassboro, NJ, Kim Vogt primarily works with incoming freshmen who are undeclared majors and with students exploring changing majors.
Ms. Vogt is a part of Rowan University's robust Exploratory Studies Program, for undeclared majors. This structured program connects students with campus-wide resources including supportive academic advising and workshops about student success, specific majors and careers.
Beth Dombkowski:
Hello. My name is Beth Dombkowski and I'm coming to you from the office of admissions at Rowan University in Glassboro, New Jersey.
Beth Dombkowski:
Welcome to Rowan Confidential. Today I have Kim Vogt with me. Welcome Kim.
Kimberly Vogt:
Hi. Thanks for having me.
Beth Dombkowski:
Absolutely. Kim is an academic advisor at Rowan University where she works with incoming freshmen who are undeclared in their major, as well as change of major students of all grade levels. She's an academic coach for academic probation students and teaches a class that specifically focuses on acclimating students to college and helping them transition successfully. She received her bachelor's degree in sociology from Rutgers University and her master's degree in counseling and educational settings from Rowan University.
Beth Dombkowski:
When she is not counseling students her part time jobs include being a yoga instructor, a cookie baker, and a dog mom. What kind of dog do you have?
Kimberly Vogt:
I have a Cairn Terrier.
Beth Dombkowski:
A Cairn Terrier.
Kimberly Vogt:
It's like Toto from the wizard of Oz.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh my goodness. You didn't name it Toto, did you?
Kimberly Vogt:
No, his name is Scruffy.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, Scruffy. Okay. Oh, that's so cute. How old is Scruffy?
Kimberly Vogt:
Scruffy is 15.
Beth Dombkowski:
15.
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh my goodness. Okay. Other than Scruffy-
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah?
Beth Dombkowski:
What wakes you up in the morning? What's your inspiration or passion?
Kimberly Vogt:
I absolutely love coming here and working with the students every day. I've had jobs in the past that I've worked where I really didn't have that feeling. And here it motivates me to come up and know that I'm going to make a difference in their day. I love the support staff that I work with and we really work well with each other and can bounce ideas off of each other. And that just really motivates me to come in here in the morning and make a difference, not only for my coworkers, but also for the entire Rowan community.
Beth Dombkowski:
You are an academic advisor. What does that mean? Maybe somebody who hasn't met with an academic advisor, what do you do? What's your relationship like with the students? How do you meet them? How do you talk to them? How do they find you?
Kimberly Vogt:
Right. A lot of students who I work with don't have a major. Every student who comes into Rowan University when they are assigned a specific major, they have a specific academic advisor that we work with. In our department there's probably about five or six of us who work with the exploratory studies or undeclared students and they can make appointments with us through online. They can make appointments by coming into our office. A lot of times we have walk-in hours from 9:00 to 10:00 every day and they can come in and meet with any of the five of us that work up there.
Kimberly Vogt:
And as an academic advisor, in our role, it's a little bit different from someone who is in a specific major because they work with students, helping them plan out their coursework for that specific major, where ours is a little bit more exploring what types of majors they want to have. And then also looking at the course work that could go towards any type of major that they want to have. Working with us, helping to develop plan of where they might want to go, and then laying out a path for how they could reach that.
Beth Dombkowski:
Working in admissions, when I meet students on the road and they say, "I'm not sure what I want to do" or "I think I want to do this, but I'm not entirely sure that's where I want to end up", they always seem to be afraid that not declaring something is going to hold them back time wise.
Kimberly Vogt:
Right.
Beth Dombkowski:
Like it's going to take them longer to graduate. Do you find that to be true at all?
Kimberly Vogt:
I find that a lot of students have a concern about that. A lot of parents have a concern about that. When in reality that's not true. I will say with the exception of a major, maybe like engineering where you really have to be on track from the very beginning, you might have to end up going an extra semester. But for the majority of different majors that are here, there are a number of courses that you can take towards that specific major or a totally major you have no idea about. And there's certain core requirements that we have here that you have to complete. We can help students take their composition course, their literature course, their artistic course, and say we know that these are going to count towards your graduation requirements no matter what.
Kimberly Vogt:
If you are still unsure as to whether you want to do education or psychology or business, that's fine. We can still set you on a path where we know that you're going to fulfill certain requirements for graduation. And then when you finally transfer into that major, you'll just have to take those major requirements. And you won't have to worry about your gen eds because the gen eds are going to be ones that you're taking anyway.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, yeah, you'd have to take them for any major.
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
The students that are coming in and they're not really sure what they want to study. What's the community like for them? I feel like some of the other majors, there are learning communities where they could live together. Are these students just kind of floating out there and oblivion or is there support for them?
Kimberly Vogt:
No. There's great support for them. There are specific ... We have one of the courses that I know that you mentioned that I was teaching, that's the one that acclimates students to college; it's called Rowan 101.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, yes.
Kimberly Vogt:
And a lot of students who are in majors sometimes don't even end up taking that course. Wherefore, the exploratory studies students who are undeclared, we make sure that they're in one of those courses and everyone who's in that course with them is also an exploratory study student. A lot of the advisors teach that course. A lot of people who work with the undeclared students teach that course to lessen their fears and say, "It's okay. You're not the only one here who doesn't know exactly what they want to do yet."
Kimberly Vogt:
And we have a great program that's called The Exploratory Studies Workshop, which allows students once a week to go and hear different speakers from each individual college, like the college of communications or the college of education, the college of business and program directors and advisors and professors will come in and talk to them and really sell their major to the students saying, "Here's why we would want you to join the radio, TV and film major", "Here's why you should join the college of business". And they can see when they're sitting in this big classroom that we have about hundreds you that are in the same position.
Kimberly Vogt:
I think it makes them feel less alone when they realize that they're not the only ones that are still trying to find their way.
Beth Dombkowski:
Now, you didn't know what you wanted to study in school? Correct?
Kimberly Vogt:
No, I didn't.
Beth Dombkowski:
You went with a sociology degree. And how did you find your way to sociology?
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah. I had switched around majors a bunch of times, which I always tell students, I started off as I think anthropology and then was in law and justice and political science for a while and finally settled on sociology. For me it was just figuring out what I was good at and what I thought that I would be able to do in the future with something. I had planned on either going to law school or I knew I was going to go to grad school.
Kimberly Vogt:
I wanted something that for me, I was a strong student in that subject and that I knew that I would get a really good GPA. And then my plan was to move forward into extra types of schooling. I knew that that was my goal and finding that goal helped me pick the major that I wanted to go with.
Beth Dombkowski:
Did you know what sociology was when you were starting college?
Kimberly Vogt:
No, I absolutely did not. And I took an intro to sociology class and I really enjoyed it about how different groups of people work together and how different communities interact and I just loved learning about it. And then from there I just sort of took off with that major. And I find that with a lot of students, they'll ask me, "What is anthropology? What is sociology?" Because that's something that a lot of students don't often have when they're in a K to 12 setting.
Beth Dombkowski:
Yeah, yeah. I tell students that all the time. When they're 17 or 18 and just starting college or thinking about this journey, there are certain jobs that you know the title of, but there's so many different ways to make money and contribute to society.
Kimberly Vogt:
Oh, yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
And there are majors they don't even know that could take them down the path that's right for them.
Kimberly Vogt:
Right.
Beth Dombkowski:
Doing this, how do you know that you're being successful?
Kimberly Vogt:
I think the thing that's interesting for us is that, again, for the advisors that work in a specific major, they work with those students for all three years or four years or however long they're in that major. For us, we know we're being successful in a way if we don't always see them again because we're the ones who are trying to set them off in a path where they're now going to be in a major.
Kimberly Vogt:
If I work with a student who is, say going towards marketing, I'll plan for them to go towards marketing and then they get into marketing and it's kind of like, well goodbye-
Beth Dombkowski:
Goodbye. Nice to you. Thank you.
Kimberly Vogt:
Which is successful for us. But it's always nice when students come back and they say, "I wouldn't have picked this major had it not been for you bringing this up", or "I always thought that I had to do a college of business major in order to get a job, but now I realize that I could do my psych degree with this minor and still go in the direction that I want to go in". And that's been really rewarding for me to show them that there's not just one path always to get to where you need to go, that there's usually a lot of times more than one option.
Kimberly Vogt:
And I think when they come back and that and say, "I love my major now and I'm so glad that you helped me find this"; that's really rewarding for me.
Beth Dombkowski:
It's amazing how at a place like Rowan, you can really have all of your interests appear on your transcript.
Kimberly Vogt:
Oh, yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
You can major in something, you can minor in something else. Even outside of the classroom. You're a yoga teacher.
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
How did that happen?
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah. I found that that gave me a lot of balance when I was in college and when I was in grad school. And it's something that I've incorporated a lot into the way that I work with students. Saying, you have to maintain some wellness in here. You have to maintain balance in your life. You have to look at where you're going long term versus where you are short term. And that's something that has really helped me in my everyday life. I have used that to incorporate that a little bit into my style of counseling.
Beth Dombkowski:
That's great. Now, I know that you work with the students.
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
I'm sure there are parents that come across your path as well.
Kimberly Vogt:
Oh, absolutely. Yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
Okay. How would you advise the parents of an incoming student that it's okay for their student to not know what it is they want to study and come in exploratory studies?
Kimberly Vogt:
Well first of all, I would say that a lot of students who come in with majors end up switching their major.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, absolutely.
Kimberly Vogt:
I think more so than people realize. We have, along with the department of working with these exploratory studies students, we also work with change of major. When students say to us, "Oh, I'm changing my major, is that weird"? No.
Beth Dombkowski:
No.
Kimberly Vogt:
We have a whole department dedicated to doing that. I think with parents saying, "Well why ... if my student doesn't know exactly what they want to do, is that going to be okay? Is their graduation going to be delayed and all?" And the answer to that would be no. And we have a whole community and resources here that are going to help your student. Like we had said, the number of classes that you're going to be taking, you could use towards a lot of different majors. And if you are planning on going towards say a more restrictive major, like an engineering or a music, we can still find things that are going to work you towards that goal and then you're still going to be on track for graduation.
Kimberly Vogt:
And sometimes it's good for students, I think to take a step back and say, "I really don't know what I want". Or even if they think they know what their long term goal is, they might not know that there's a lot of different pathways to get them to where they want to go and we can help them find the path that's best for them. And I think that that's why it's so important that they sometimes come in without always a specific goal in mind because then they have more possibility for where they can end up.
Beth Dombkowski:
It's so important that they try things. I tell students all the time, if you do something and you don't like it, like if you do an internship and you don't like it or you take a class and you don't like it, that's a good thing because you've learned something, you've learned you don't want to do.
Kimberly Vogt:
Oh, that's absolutely.
Beth Dombkowski:
And it sounds like you and I actually had a similar experience. We were both thinking about going to law school. What was your deciding factor that this was not for you?
Kimberly Vogt:
Oh, it was when I started working at a law firm.
Beth Dombkowski:
Yes.
Kimberly Vogt:
Because I had an idea in my mind of what I wanted to do for law. And then I got into a job and I started working there and I thought, no, I don't like doing all this reading and researching and writing and it just wasn't for me. And I saw that pretty quickly, which is one of the reasons why I ended up coming back here and going to grad school for counseling because there's a lot of things that I think I would have done differently if I'm looking back now.
Kimberly Vogt:
But once you get in there and start experiencing a certain work environment, so many times we always tell students, do internships, talk to people who work in the field, figure out what it is that this field actually is because there's a lot of common misconceptions about different lines of work.
Beth Dombkowski:
Yes.
Kimberly Vogt:
And I've had students that are in a major and come in to meet with me as a change of major because of the fact that they say, "I went in and did an internship over the summer and I absolutely hate this".
Beth Dombkowski:
Yes.
Kimberly Vogt:
"Is there still time to change my major?" And usually the answer is yes, there's absolutely, because we would rather have you change now than have you go out into the workforce and then you've worked for a year or two and you realize you hate this and now you have no option except to maybe come back and get another degree or you're trying to navigate things then. It's a lot easier when you're in school to do that.
Beth Dombkowski:
When you were starting out, I'm sure people gave you advice, what advice would you give your 18 year old self knowing what you know now about college, about grad school, about the different pathways that students can take?
Kimberly Vogt:
Right. I would say first of all, keep your options open. I think that a lot of students come in feeling really lost because they don't have a specific goal in mind. And that's fine because you know you have endless possibilities for what you could do here. And I think sometimes that's scary for them, but to really say, take this opportunity to then talk to your professors, talk to your counselors, talk to your academic advisors, talk to people who are in the field that you think you want to be in, and actually find out what that is and then ask them how they got where they are.
Kimberly Vogt:
Because a lot of times people will have these totally different backgrounds or they changed jobs later on. Even for me, if you said, well, being a specific academic advisor, you must have a specific background. Well not necessarily. There's so many people who work in our office and one has a background in athletics and one has a background in history and one has a background in hospitality and we all ended up in the same place.
Kimberly Vogt:
It's just as important, like you said, to start knocking off what you don't want to do, as opposed to knowing exactly what you do want to do. And I would say just get as much information as you can from anyone. You can talk to your parent's friends, if anybody has any ideas of what you think you want, it's always important to find out from people what that actually is like in the real world.
Beth Dombkowski:
Yeah, see what the day to days are like and try to reverse engineer it so that you can get there.
Kimberly Vogt:
Yeah, exactly.
Beth Dombkowski:
Lastly, why Rowan? Why Rowan for you? Why Rowan for students?
Kimberly Vogt:
I really appreciate the community that's here. Like I said, I love all of the people that I work with on a day to day basis. And I think that there's a really large support system for students who are here. One of the things that I love about the university ,because as I said, I not sure if I mentioned it, but I transferred schools. I went to two different schools.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, no you didn't.
Kimberly Vogt:
I originally went to the University of Delaware and then I finished up at Rutgers and then I've been here at Rowan for my master's. I've been quite a few places. And I love that this school has a lot of the, obviously the big school opportunities, but with the small school feel.
Beth Dombkowski:
Yeah.
Kimberly Vogt:
There's a lot here that gives the students the support that maybe you're not just going to be a number because your class has 500 people in it. We don't have anything like that. But yet if you want to go watch the football game and go to homecoming, we do have that for you. I think that you get a lot of the opportunities that the big schools would give you, but you have that small school environment, that small support system. I know my students' names in my classes and I know my students who come in for advising and you really get that one on one with the people who work here and your professors and everything, which I think makes it feel more like home.
Beth Dombkowski:
Oh, that's wonderful. That's great. Well, thank you so much for coming out and talking to us today.
Kimberly Vogt:
Thank you for having me, yeah.
Beth Dombkowski:
And this has been Kim Vogt on Rowan Confidential.