Daily Pioneer News

UWP's chair of the civil and environmental engineering department Max Anderson advises between 40 and 50 students a semester. He was selected as one of this year's outstanding academic advisors and will be honored at the Chancellor's Convocation Sept. 2.

PLATTEVILLE - Heading into his 25th year at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, civil and environmental engineering professor Max Anderson has been selected as one of this year's outstanding academic advisors.

Anderson said advising isn't just helping students schedule classes but also helping students develop academic plans that will help them achieve success at UWP.

"I try to help them to identify what it is they want to accomplish," Anderson said.

"Max is very good at planning ahead with students, so they have a vision of what's necessary to move forward," general engineering professor Joanne Wilson said.

Anderson typically advises between 40 to 50 students a semester.

"During that three-week registration period, I'm busy doing advising 4-5 hours a day. It's just one after the other," Anderson said. "I set up a schedule outside my door to give them a guaranteed time to meet with me." Anderson sets aside 30-minute blocks for each advisee, but sometimes students need more time.

Advising encompasses more than just scheduling classes. Anderson said he also aids those students who want to change majors or transfer, and also helps students get internships. He said he always tries to emphasize the importance of real-world work experience.

"Companies look for the experience more than they look for grades of classes they've taken," Anderson said. "I've been here long enough that I know many of our engineering alumni and can often give students here a direct contact for a co-op or internship."

"He seems to keep up on everybody," Wilson said. "He's very good at remembering students who have graduated years ago. If you mentioned a name, he could probably tell you where they are working."

Anderson, who also serves as chairperson of the environmental and civil engineering department, also developed a waiting list for department classes to help make full use of space available in classrooms.

"When people register, we try to accommodate everyone on the waiting list," Anderson said. "We haven't had anyone not be able to graduate because they couldn't get into one of the classes they needed."

Senior UWP student Sarah Curran, who is working this summer on the Hwy. 151 construction project outside of Platteville, is one of Anderson's advisees.

"He's different from anybody else I've heard about. He'll actually sit down with you and talk about what the classes are like," Curran said. "He's good at giving advice, and he tell you what he would recommend taking."

Anderson especially helped Curran when she was gone from the University for a semester doing an internship co-op and needed to register for classes for the following semester.

"It was hard when I was gone on co-op because there was no one there to help me," Curran said. "Max and I had several phone conversations, and that helped me out."

She also praised Anderson's commitment to activities his students participate in. Curran is active in the American Society of Civil Engineers and

competed in the concrete canoe competition in Iowa last year. Anderson went out of his way to show support for the team.

"For concrete canoe he came out and took pictures, and made sure everyone on the team got a team picture. I thought that was pretty cool," Curran said.

"He is genuinely committed to his students," Wilson said. "He's interested in his students succeeding."

Anderson will be honored along with Joe Lomax and Sue Price as this year's outstanding academic advisors at the Chancellor's Convocation Sept. 2. Other nominees for the award included Michael Compton, Charles Cornett, David Drury, Mohan Gill, Deb Kinder, Corinne Enright, Rea Kirk, Joe Schmalfeldt and Kim Tuescher.