My advisor is a lying *****.

[RinkuTheFirst]

She is extremely rude, hard to get a hold of, and is generally unpleasant. She literally takes pleasure in making students cry.

She also lies like crazy. I'm an education major, which means I have to do so many observation hours each semester. I set up my schedule for the fall so that I would have Fridays off, which will make it easier to get those hours in. My advisor basically called me an idiot and said, "You're not going to be able to observe on Fridays, those are usually testing days." BULL ******* CRAP. I have been to numerous schools around the area and tests are always all over the place. I've observed every day of the week.

She also called me an idiot basically until I signed up for a non-internet version of a class that I've been told by multiple people to take online.

I dread going to see her. I always have my schedule ready, because I actually read the requirements for my degree, so I know what I need, but she always drags it out with complete crap. She's misled me numerous times and she's just a horrible person in general.

I may have ranted about this before, but I needed to get it off my chest again. One thing she told me, for one of the classes I'm taking, is that it was going to require 30 hours of observation, which would put my total around 90 (which is a really large number to try to do in one semester). Yeah, I went to the professor of the class and asked her. It's only going to be 9 hours.

[Tyler]

My advisor basically called me an idiot and said, "You're not going to be able to observe on Fridays, those are usually testing days." BULL ******* CRAP. I have been to numerous schools around the area and tests are always all over the place. I've observed every day of the week.

This. We take tests at random. Chances are she's being a jerk and simply wants to annoy you.

[The Flattest Pancake]

Everyone's different. Some people are nice. Some are not. You advisor is not.

[CaptHayfever]

Are you still with the general academic advisor (because they typically know jack-squat about anything but the core curriculum), or is this your departmental major advisor?

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[RinkuTheFirst]

Are you still with the general academic advisor (because they typically know jack-squat about anything but the core curriculum), or is this your departmental major advisor?

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

The latter. It's not that advisors at my school suck or anything; all the other advisors I've had before were great. They were all actually professors though; this woman only advises.

[CaptHayfever]

You should be able to request a different one, then. Just talk to the department office.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[smol Kat]

Chew her out; it worked for my department's advising secretary.

[RinkuTheFirst]

You should be able to request a different one, then. Just talk to the department office.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

I've considered it. She's supposed to be the advisor for my content area too, sort of. It's weird, because the education advisor you have is assigned to you based on your content area, but you also have a content area advisor who's usually a professor in the department of your content area. She's the only one for this content/education matchup and, since I'm likely going to have to deal with the woman when I do my internship, I'd rather not piss her off by basically saying, "You're a crappy advisor, I'd like a new one."

All that said, I just needed to vent. I only have to meet with her once a semester. It's painful, but it's over quick enough.

[CaptHayfever]

Ah, I gotcha. I was in a similar situation for my Master's degree - only 1 choice of advisor for my teaching content area. Luckily for me, though, she & I didn't have our falling out until I was almost done with my research, & so I was able to get a new advisor to oversee my research & just never have to see her again.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"

[The Missing Link]

Piece of advice #1: Go to the department chair or vice chair and discuss this with them. There should be multiple advisers in each department, so it should be totally possible to switch. Worst case, making a point of going and saying that things aren't working out with your adviser and you should at least perk up their attention that there might be a deeper issue that needs addressing.

Piece of advice #2: Don't freaking go to your adviser. I think the only time I went to my computer science adviser was during my freshman year to schedule my first set of classes and during my senior year so I could get his signature to acknowledge that I had met all of the requirements. (My math adviser I saw more than once, but that's also because I liked him.) If you're already on top of things, then you should have an easy time of things.

Piece of advise #3: [strike]Run around naked on campus.[/strike] If nothing else seems to work, however, then nothing is preventing you from tuning out the moment you get in there. Turn your brain off, stare lifelessly into space as she goes on... and then just continue by saying, "All I need is your signature, thanks." She's there to advise, and if she's not advising, you might as well not take anything else.

[RinkuTheFirst]

TML, wonderful advice, thank you. Like I said, I just needed to vent. I really only have to talk to this woman once a semester, so I can handle things the way they are now unless she escalates it.

That said, I HAVE to talk to her each semester. At my university, you have to have a special PIN to register for classes and you can only get it once you've gone through an advising session. This advisor is the only one who has my PIN (for some reason, they never give the content area advsiors the PIN). As I understand it, in some departments, the advisors (who are usually professors) are more lax and will just give you your PIN if you ask, but from what I can tell, the Education department is not one of them.

[CaptHayfever]

When I started, our advisors had to give us registration codes, too (eventually Truman changed that system, thankfully, because it was a pain for everyone to schedule those meetings in such a short window of time). However, if you do ultimately decide to request a new advisor, that person will get the PIN instead.

And remember, "I'm-a Luigi, number one!"