Difficulty Getting Classes Freshman Year

Parents Forum
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In which case it may be somewhat appropriate that she too is given priority, but for courses on her MAJOR track (where other Biology minors would then take second row). It goes both ways: there’ll be semesters where she’ll snap up the most sought-after Biology labs, while Art majors will have to show flexibility.

It’s not done in bad faith. There will be people with multiple majors or double-minors. It’s someone implicit in the word “priority” that one cannot reasonably expect that everyone’s secondary/tertiary choices will fit everyone’s preferred timeline.

Based on her school’s site on Studio Art minors:

“Any student choosing studio art as a minor must consult the chair of the Department of Art for program approval. It is recommended that students begin work for the minor not later than the beginning of the second year. Students electing to minor in studio art are required to take any six studio art courses and any two courses in art history.”

While I understand her disappointment, maybe she’ll be able to “knock off” some of the art history, or possibly general education requirements - and then have a more flexible timetable when the Department needs to give her priority placement next year in line with her minor.

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I’ll validate the OP. My daughter chose her university because of its robust dance program. She only considered schools with dance programs as it was extremely important to her - even though she chose not to major in dance. Everyone knows that no student can get every class, that’s not what the OP stated. If NO dance classes were available at ALL prior to her registration, she’d be extremely disappointed. Colleges are dealing with covid, that doesn’t mean you can’t expect more from a school that touts a particular program when they clearly don’t have enough seats in ANY classes for that program for their freshman.

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Not really sure if your “mundane” comment was referring to me or not. I hope not.

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There are colleges which have tenure track teaching professor jobs. Example: Will’s Teaching Professor FAQ

However, many colleges have this function, but probably not what you are thinking of: they hire adjunct faculty on a piece work basis, usually resulting in full time work at relatively low pay for the adjunct instructor teaching a few courses during a semester (not necessarily all at the same college).

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Yes, that is exactly my point, thank you.

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Ahh, I can see you figured out my daughter’s school. :grinning: I was trying not to give them a bad rap and name them as there is actually quite a lot that is good there. And yes, my daughter is trying to make the best of it and fill with other requirements. But she chose this school b/c they prided themselves in being able to major/minor in totally different subjects, she’s always been a science kid but also an art kid too. The first semester she was required to take Bio and Chem, both have labs and just couldnt fit in art too which runs longer than the typical class. So she planned on taking art second semester. And then was disappointed to be shut out of all prereq art classes. She misses making art as a creative outlet and was just so disappointed. Will she get over it, yes, of course but I had higher expectations for this college, silly me. (Oh and by the way, there were no art classes avail to half the freshman class regardless if you were majoring in art or not. You cant even declare a major this early.)

Thank you for taking the time to really read my post and even look up the requirements.

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Thank you for the validation and feedback.

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if the situation impacts half the freshman class (rather than a handful here and there), then they have enough standing to go see the Freshman Dean and explain there’s a problem. Obviously the small delegation should be non confrontational but if, say, 200 or 280 students were entirely shut out of art classes then there may be a unique situation and unless the college is aware of it, they can’t do anything about it. Good life lesson for the students, too: how to bring a problem to the fore in a respectful manner. Of course it doesn’t mean there’ll necessarily be a positive ending for all or for your daughter but hopefully something will be gained from the attempt, be it priority as a sophomore or negotiating skills…

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I totally get that! My daughter was also always very strong academically with an ambitious AP and honors schedule. But already in high school I came to realize that performing arts and learning about creative arts (absent the talent to be an artist herself) offered an important counter-balance to the academic rigor, even if it meant to set aside even more hours (before and after regular classes.)

Even in college she continued to fit art history courses into every semester; actually seeming more bubbly about those than the “mundane major” classes :wink:. I should not have been surprised that she too turned that passion into a minor.

Where I’m leading to…
Early-on she joined a club that produces on-campus music performances, which involves conducting artist interviews, create flyers and other artwork, etc. - and she joined the editorial team of a (quite impressive) undergraduate art history journal, which usually also includes illustrations by (fellow) editors.

Maybe, after the initial disappointment, your daughter would care to explore similar creative options that the college might offer. It would give her a chance to actively pursue her passion without the limits/availability of a structured course.

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Thanks for sharing this. It’s so wonderful to watch our kids find their passions. My daughter actually has always done back stage crew for theater in high school and she is doing a bit of this in college too, helping to build sets and learning about lighting. I hope she finds other creative outlets like your daughter has. Creative people usually do find a way! We are also talking about her maybe taking an art class this summer at our local community college. It will help fill her requirements but I think she’d also really enjoy having that over the summer too. (Of course more $ too, sigh, but I think worth it.) Thanks for your thoughtful responses.

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All courses are subject to enrollment limits, but what matters is whether the actual enrollment typically reaches the limit (i.e. some students are unable to take the course). Some colleges do show in the public online class schedules the actual enrollment and the limit. If the actual enrollment is regularly at the limit for classes of interest, then difficulty enrolling in the classes can be expected (note that checking late in the term may show some apparent space due drops after the add deadline, so be careful with that).

Where actual enrollment is regularly at the limit, investigate how enrollment priority is done. For example, are students in the major prioritized for courses needed for their majors? Do frosh level gateway courses for various majors give priority for undeclared frosh over juniors and seniors looking for out-of-major electives?

Also, realize that adding capacity may be more difficult for some subjects than others. Some subjects may be more difficult to add either tenure track or adjunct faculty due to industry competition (e.g. computer science). Others may be facility limited as well as instructor limited (e.g. visual and performing arts, or anything that requires lab facilities), so adding instructors or increasing class size may not by itself allow more students to enroll.

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Where would one find that information on a college website? My D’s college doesn’t seem to publish that information but would love to try to look up this information for my S22 as he is trying to make his decisions. If you could give a link to an example, that would be great as I’m not really sure what I’m looking for.

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At my daughter’s school they use something called “Master Scheduler” and from there you can see the lists of courses offered and how many seats were taken. You can look up past semesters/years. I am not sure if this Master Scheduler is used at a lot of schools or not.

The hard part is that when you are dealing with a 17 yo looking at colleges they really don’t care too much about this kind of stuff, until they get there and can’t get a class they want!

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I would look in the “department” page and/or “course catalogue” - it’s basically the same place where students go before registering, where they’ll learn whatever prerequisites and limits related to a particular course, whether it might be that “instructor approval required”, or “only available to majors”, or “limited to 15 students”, “requires application”, etc.

Below an example for one college. I picked “Art History” as the department, and then across the tabs on the top, picked “Courses”:
https://catalog.barnard.edu/barnard-college/courses-instruction/art-history/#coursestext

The other tabs will explain whatever minimal requirements for a major or minor etc., in what year courses should be taken and similar details.

There there is a page that explains the general procedures with several FAQs to peruse:
https://barnard.edu/registeringforclasses

And then there is a live view:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/sel/ARHB_Spring2022.html
where you can see the current enrollment, limits etc.

You can look at PREVIOUS semesters (like Fall 2021) to see the actual enrollment, which classes were full, etc.:
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/bulletin/uwb/sel/ARHB_Fall2021.html
(As you can see, there had been two full classes, both Senior-level. So lower-classwomen would not have had problems.)

Finally you can drill down to a particular course, look up the syllabus, required books, etc.: Student Information System - Vergil

After scheduling a fairly expansive catalogue of courses and electives at our high school for 4 years, navigating pre-requisites and managing limited availability (and scheduling conflicts), the kids at our HS seemed fairly attuned to these matters.

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Sometimes sections are added if there is a lot of interest. Our son at Bowdoin couldn’t get into a Physics class he needed. I believe the class was maxed at 30 with three ten person labs. There were four kids including him on the waitlist. They got together and talked to the professor. He increased the class size to 34 to get them in and then added a fourth lab that worked with all of their schedules. Bonus- only four kids in their lab. Downside? It was on Friday afternoon. Lol. But they jumped at the chance!

That being said, art classes can be very very small. Like eight students small. I would have your D find out if most sophs got in. Maybe she can get in next fall. Sometimes freshmen can’t get what they want but, at most LACs, majors are between 10-12 classes and it’s really easy to get all of those classes done in just three years.

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Of course, every classroom can only hold so many students. However, many colleges don’t explicitly state what the limits are most of their classes except those with low, or lower than expected, limits.

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Maybe it was just my daughter, but as a high school student she was more interested in looking at the dorms, what the vibe was like, etc more than looking at course catalogues! :grinning: :joy: :grinning: But I totally agree with this advice that it’s important to look into so there aren’t big surprises once you enroll.

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It is not unusual for freshmen to get locked out of certain classes (regardless of the size of the college). Since it is an elective the class it can wait. I’d encourage your daughter to use the slot to take a required class so she will have more open slots when she can get into her preferred class.

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