I’m an honors student, and I’m considering doing early move-in on the 7th of August, three days of Camp 1831, and then doing Orientation on the 11th.
Is this feasible? Do I need to do orientation before moving into my dorm? Also, I’m an honors student, so would I miss out by doing non honors orientation? I would appreciate any guidance.
I can answer the honors part - you won’t miss much of anything by doing a non-honors orientation. Seats in honors classes are generally released at non-honors Bama Bounds as well (I think maybe in proportion to the number of honors students attending that orientation). There is usually an honors college reception during the Honors BBs, but it’s not a big deal. When my daughter and I attended it was really crowded and she didn’t have an opportunity to speak with any of the professors (there were some there but hard to meet because it was crowded). I wouldn’t hesitate to go to a non-honors BB if it’s more convenient for you.
No problem doing things in the order you suggest - that’s exactly what my student did.
But don’t believe what anybody tells you about seats being held for the later orientation sessions - it’s just not so! By the time my student registered, pretty much everything he wanted was closed. So you need to be prepared for that. Here’s what you do:
(1) Go to the prof ahead of time (for any class that’s already closed before your orientation date) and ask for an override. The prof may or may not agree.
(2) Sign up for anything at your orientation session, just so you’ve got your required number of credit hours.
(3) Then monitor the course openings like a hawk! There will be openings in every one of the classes you want - you just have to be paying attention so that you can grab the seat when it becomes available. (And the openings often show up in the middle of the night, so if you have family members who are willing to help you with this, so much the better.)
In my student’s case, he got every class he wanted, plus a few others that he ended up passing on. These included seminars with less than 15 seats! So, it’s absolutely possible to get everything you want, no matter when you register.
Dodgersmom, what classes was your son trying to get? Seats in classes typically taken by freshmen are opened up at later orientations. Maybe not every class with every professor, but there will be classes available. That is not the case for upper level classes, which are often completely full even before the first Bama Bound is held. My daughter went to an early honors BB. 3 seats in the honors English class she wanted were opened that day - not the full 18 seats that the class would eventually have. They were saving seats for later BBs. On the other hand, the 200-level business classes she wanted to take (because she had AP credit for many 100 levels) were full, and no additional seats were ever released (though some became available when upperclassment switched their schedules around). Seats for the freshmen-only honors classes were released in small numbers over the course of the summer orientations, but the 300-level honors classes were mostly full, even at the May BBs, because the upperclassmen had already filled those classes. I know for a fact that new seats opened up at Bama Bounds over the summer because my daughter logged in to MyBama and watched course availability on the 2nd day of each BB to see if spots became available in classes she wanted but hadn’t been able to sign up for during her own BB.
While I agree 100% with paying attention and watching for open spots in classes one wants - my daughter did it with great success - it is not reasonable to expect that there will be an opening in every class a student might want. Some students will get lucky and a spot will open up, but others will not get into their first choice classes. There was an honors seminar that my daughter tried to get into for 4 semesters before she finally lucked into it. That said, the vast majority of students who tinker with their schedules after Bama Bound end up with a satisfactory schedule.
I’m confused–how do we sign up for classes before Bamabound? I thought we were supposed to sign up for classes during orientation.
You can’t sign up for classes before BamaBound, but you can see if there are any seats left in the classes you want. And you can contact the prof (either by email or in person when you get to campus) and ask them to grant you an override to get a seat in an otherwise closed course. If they agree, when it’s time for you to register (at BamaBound) the override will allow you to sign up for that class.
Sheesh, @“beth’s mom” - my memory’s not that good! Had to go and look it up. The classes that were closed included an honors section of intro psychology, an intro CS course, microeconomics, and his preferred sections of two one-credit intro to engineering courses and STEM to MBA, as well as any non-conflicting section of the lab course for intro biology. ALL of these eventually came available except the biology lab! Obviously couldn’t take them all, but ended up getting to choose his favorites.
What we discovered is that even though the honors college may hold seats in its own courses for the later BamaBound sessions, the other departments (such as psychology) are under no obligation to do that for their honors sections . . . and, in our experience, they don’t.