Life Coaching

Advisors are experts in degree requirements, policy, procedures, and campus resources. Advisors often provide new information to students, guide important and recommended direction for students to follow, and do most of the talking. 

Coaches do not advise on academics/degree requirements. Coaching considers students the experts of their own lives. Coaches help students in a partnership to create steps toward their future goals. A coach takes a vested interest in a student’s life and will ask curious questions. 

Therapists provide mental health treatment and treat significant emotional and relational concerns. Therapy is designed to help you understand your own internal emotional and psychological workings that can contribute to behavior patterns or obstacles to reaching your goals. Therapy is focused on the past and present. Both therapist and client are asking and answering questions.  

Coaches help you think through the best way for you to complete tasks and define the action steps needed to reach your goal. Coaching is goal oriented. Coaching focuses on the “how” whereas therapy focuses on the “why.” Life coaches help you think through the best way for you to complete tasks and define the action steps needed to reach your goal. Life coaching focuses on the future self. 

Career advisors expertly help students navigate career exploration, development, decision making, and transition processes. Career advising involves self-exploration, labor market research, planning experiences, making connections, and launching into desired next steps (grad school, job, etc.)  

Coaches help students explore and think through how to approach action steps which could pertain to a career-related topic. Coaching has the tools to support your personal creativity, growth, and discovering your own solutions for life decisions, career shifts, or work/school related challenges. Coaching can help if you are feeling stuck, need to explore new possibilities, and ensure you do not lose focus.  

Mentors are often paired with mentees in corresponding career fields. They have acquired work experience and can provide you with networking opportunities and resources. Mentors may also be someone that you are paired with surrounding identity. This can be helpful to feel a sense of belonging, especially at a large institution. 

Coaches are not viewed as positionally more experienced to a person seeking coaching, nor do they necessarily prioritize any selective identities in a coaching relationship. Coaches are interested in co-working with students to facilitate productive conversation that leads to transformational life change.  

Examples may include: 

• “I feel overwhelmed with organizing my time and completing assignments.”  

• “I would like to get better at prioritizing.”  

• “I would like to communicate better with my roommate.” 

• “My major is challenging, and I want to figure out ways to stay motivated.” 

• “I’m having a hard time figuring out where my passion is and what I want to do with my life.” 

Every coaching session is unique and designed to be an open space for student exploration and coach facilitation, but some of the elements may include:  

• Setting a topic agenda for the session (students bring what they would like to talk about for the time). 

• Exploration of topic agenda through various coaching tools and strategies 

• Accountability check-ins 

• Creating new action steps for the future 

NatSci offers life coaching free. There is no cost. 

Students are encouraged to use our life coaching service for as long as they would like.  

The introductory session takes 30 minutes to complete. Subsequent sessions are for one hour. 

Students will be able to select the frequency of meetings as your schedule allows. You may choose to meet weekly, biweekly, or monthly. 

Yes, under the terms of FERPA, life coaching is confidential. However, your life coaches are mandatory reporters which means anything related to Relation Violence and Sexual Misconduct (RVSM) will be reported to the Office for Civil Rights and Title IX Education Compliance.