New college trend in scheduling?

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/5/05 at 5:57pm

So my brother just returned from his college orientation, he is going to be a freshman in the fall, and it turns out that since last year when I first started there the college has changed its policy on scheduling. Now new incoming freshman do not get to choose the courses they take their first semester, the courses are chosen for them, and the student only gets to submit an extremely vague preferences form...

Now personally this seems like an outrageous policy to me...When paying thousands of dollars of tuition, yes I'll use the word one certainly should be entitled to choose what classes one takes...and it is even more shocking to find that there are now so many requirements completely uninvolved with ones major, that it doesn't particularly matter what one takes because they have generalized the study so extensively...

The real issue however arises for commuter students... particularly in my brother and my situation as we were and quite frankly have to commute together...we only have one car, and only so much money for gas, and now there is no guarantee and quite frankly it is almost a statistical impossibility that are schedules will be similar and this will be possible...

Is this a policy many colleges are starting to adopt? anyone else encountered the same problem yet? I suppose its not quite a big as problem if one stays in dorms...

[Dirty Rotten Scoundrel]

Posted: 8/5/05 at 6:02pm

AMEN!

[Plum]

Posted: 8/5/05 at 6:07pm

Depends on the college. Some places have an extremely strict set curriculum for all four years, but you know that going in. I think it's fair enough if they tell you from the start about it, especially in those schools that have 99% of their students living on campus. Good luck with your transportation issues.

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 1:05am

That's disturbing, and suggests very generalized first-year courses. I would say that a university with such a policy for incoming students probably doesn't have a good undergraduate program in the first place. I guess it's too late for your brother to switch, eh?

Updated On: 8/6/05 at 01:05 AM

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 11:55am

Unfortuantly there were never much college options for either of us, This is actually a really great science/math school which is great for him, however i'm an english major and already completely miserable there...Howeer, its SUNY so its cheap, its close to where we live so we don't have to pay for dorms, and even I have to begrudgingly admit that its a decent school...

However, they truly sprung this no self scheduling policy on us at the last minute, it certainly wasn't that way last year, and if they mentioned it anywhere it would have to have been in tiny tiny print...

[Taryn]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 11:59am

That really is quite unfortunate. I was lucky enough to find a school that without any required cirriculum other than one writing course, but it's sad to me that there are colleges that will just pick all your classes for you.

[M J R]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 12:00pm

Well, that totally sucks. But if this place is your only option, and it's only for a semester, you can tough it out. Besides, they are all courses that you would have to take at some point anyways, I'm guessing?

As a music/theatre major, my schedule was pre-ordained for four years! I got to choose my "PE elective" one semester - that was it!

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 12:00pm

Uhm, Student Board?

[Plum]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 12:04pm

Taryn, sometimes a preset curriculum is a good thing, and the very reason people choose to go to a certain school. St. John's in Annapolis/Santa Fe comes to mind. The entire program is based on discussion of the Western literary and philosophical canon, relying almost entirely on primary texts. It's really a fascinating thing.

This, of course, is a completely different story.

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:03pm

Once the schedule is set, can your brother drop and add classes? Perhaps this would allow him to readjust the class times?

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:10pm

Who knows? Its a new schedule they didn't bother to explain to anyone, however, on monday hes going to make an appointment and hopefully explain the extentuating circumstances...Looking forward to fighting through mounds of red tape...

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:18pm

What's disturbing is that your brother is paying per course (or at least I'm assuming so), and that seems to be just a liberal arts degree. It's one thing if your brother was, from the get-go, taking a specific program (as Plum described). However, if this was a regular first-year like at most universities, I'd be angry if the school was forcing me to pay for courses I neither want nor need.

[Plum]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:27pm

Sounds like they want to make sure all their freshmen are all up to a certain standard in the fundamentals- writing skills, especially, if my intuition is correct. Which of course, leads one to wonder why they can't weed out those who aren't up to those standards through the admissions process.

I'm also having slight issues with a requirement that was added to my major after I got in, and I think that's the key to your argument, too- the fact that it wasn't outlined from the start. Fight the man! :P

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:31pm

I mean the school has always had alot of dec(diversified education courses), which one has to fulfill, but in the past you got to choose how you fulfilled them...for example there is an american history dec one has to fulfil...and since i'm an english major I'm choosing to fulfill it with a course called survey of American literature...

Freshman won't have that choice...

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:35pm

I'm also having slight issues with a requirement that was added to my major after I got in, and I think that's the key to your argument, too- the fact that it wasn't outlined from the start. Fight the man! :P

I hear ya, Plum. The Computer Science department at the University of Toronto completely revamped their undergraduate curriculum a few years ago, almost leaving me stranded in mid-degree. The department told me I could follow the old curriculum as outlined in my freshman year calendar, but it became increasingly harder to do that as old courses were discontinued.

[Plum]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:44pm

Heh. Our comp sci and math departments just went through a bit of an overhaul, too, but I'm an English major. My issue is deceptively simple- they added one "core course" requirement. Now, you'd think that would be easy- just take the damn course, right?

Wrong! See, I'm in the very stiffly scheduled Honors program, which means I'm up to my limit in English courses for my four years. If I take one more English class (like that core course), I'll have to take one more non-English credit as well. And I really don't want to increase my courseload when I'm in the middle of the Honors program. Oy. Anyway, it's a minor problem compared to yours and BluCat's, so I'm going to shut up now. :)

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 3:54pm

haha complain away, if more than one thread is started, we'll all be shipped off to the wasteland that is known as the student board...

Posted: 8/6/05 at 5:16pm

I know you'll find this offensive, and I really don't mean it to be. Sill, I'm going to say it anyway....

This should have been created on the Student Board out of courtesy to majority of the other posters who happen not to have college-age problems.

[Taryn]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 5:54pm

Very true, Plum. My father's best friend, now a very successful lawyer, went to Saint John's. For me personally, though, I was very attracted to the University of Rochester's standard that students will always do best in classes they are interested in and will always be the most interested when they are in classes they want to be taking. It's just a good fit with me. And I know UR's admissions program is pretty tight, which I would imagine they use to bring in students they think would best fit their program.

[Plum]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 6:06pm

Jose', why don't you move the thread? Misplaced topics aren't exactly a new phenomenon.
Updated On: 8/6/05 at 06:06 PM

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 8/6/05 at 6:27pm

Funny, I thought the so-called "Student Board" was just a euphemism for the depository holding all the WICKED-and-other-banal-topics threads.

[Plum]

Posted: 8/7/05 at 12:54am

Nah, as far as I can see the latest on Idina's dandruff is still on the main board. And as Jose' has so kindly pointed out, we continue to pollute the OT board with our adolescent prattling as well. :P

[BlueWizard]

Posted: 8/7/05 at 8:01pm

That's what the academic advisors at the Registrar's Office are for!

I'm wondering, do other universities have an "Anti-Calendar"? At the University of Toronto, students can fill out a survey for each of their courses near the end of the term, rating the course, reading list, professor, level of diffulty, etc. At the beginning of the following year, the student union publishes the results in the anti-calendar booklet, which grades the courses and professors. It helps greatly in deciding on what to take.

[Plum]

Posted: 8/7/05 at 8:07pm

We have anonymous paper professor evaluations, which are used by the profs to find the strong and weak points in their work, and we have the equally anonymous online course evaluations, which are published in a manner similar to your "anti-calendar." Unfortunately, the latter has a lot of gaps in it and a small sample size for most of the courses. But it has been helpful to me sometimes. And there's always 52 different kinds of advisors for everything. :P
Updated On: 8/7/05 at 08:07 PM

[BluCat500]

Posted: 8/7/05 at 8:18pm

haha so what we're learning is this is not a college trend, my college just sucks...Well good to know I suppose