<p>doubleplay, good advice about classes that are "full". My son has also found that the advisors in the honors department at his school are happy to help someone who asks for help. They have emailed profs on his behalf before to try to get him into "full" classes. These students absolutely need to advocate for themselves.</p>
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She can get all 3 done pretty easily if she manages her schedule well.
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<p>Even when there are not caps to enrolment, scheduling is the greatest bar to having multiple majors. One is hard enough with scheduling conflicts. Too any profs want to teach at the same time, too many students prefer not to get up early enough for 9am classes, too many sections are scheduled for the afternoon, too many students have sports, ECs, work in the afternoon.... As a result, classes tend to be held between 10 and 3, Tuesdays and Thursdays, with many classes in the same department scheduled for the same time slot. </p>
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She is also planning to do 3 or more majors
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Some students would be glad to have no scheduling conflict with only one major!</p>
<p>If I were queen of the college scheduling process, I'd implement some automated way of prioritizing the scheduling based on a chosen "primary" major (your number "one" major)- you have priority scheduling in the classes you need for your primary; if you want multiple majors or to dabble in other sought-after prerequisite classes unrelated to your major, then you fly standby on those classes. That way ALL students would be more confident of getting, at the very least, the classes they need for one major.</p>
<p>This is the way they run the honors classes at my kids' school- they're available to any students, but the honors students have first dibs. I see no reason why the same process couldn't be applied to declared majors.</p>
<p>doubleplay In my experience, many schools do just that. They hold places (sometimes all places) in classes for majors. After majors have been accomodated, courses open for minors or the student body at large.</p>
<p>doubleday, at the school my son attends if you get closed out of a class that you need for your major then you may get "an override" from your advisor. You cannot choose your time slot, professor, or section. You'll be placed in a section that won't overlap with other classes. Also, seniors have priority over juniors, and so on (this is important for the required general ed classes that one must take to graduate). My son told me that one will get the classes needed to graduate.</p>
<p>Upperclassmen have priority scheduling; the more credit hours under your belt the better your priority. Also, I've heard that in spite of the teeth gnashing, students eventually end up in the classes they need. They've become quite resourceful, to the point of mucking up the process. For example, students will sign up for one or two more classes than they really want to take, attend the first few days of classes, then decide which to drop. Or they decide which to drop after they find out the teachers they will have. And they get other students with earlier schedule dates to sign up for hard-to-get classes for them, hold onto them until they register, then they go online "together" and one drops while the other adds the class. So it's not unlikely that by or during the first few days of school, a hundred seats may suddenly open up in an otherwise closed out class. </p>
<p>It's like there's a whole black market thing going on. It really is an amazing case study of creativity and opportunism within the course registration marketplace.</p>
<p>Some different thougts about the 3 majors:</p>
<p>She may not need to pick up Spanish to teach. I have a cousin who is a certified "business teacher." Check with your state regarding certification requirements but that may be a possibility. </p>
<p>She may not need to pursue education as an undergraduate at <em>all.</em> Have you looked at Teach for America or alternate certification programs? It may be possible to begin teaching in the public schools without any sort of teaching certification. Also, if she decides to enter teaching after she's earned an unrelated Bachelor's, there may be a program where the school district will pay for her to earn a teaching Master's if she agrees to work for them for a number of years. There's also the possibility of teaching in private schools. Those teachers usually don't need any certification.</p>
<p>Additionally, some colleges recommend attending the class you have been closed out of on the first day and talking to the professor, sometimes they have the ability to override the class size and accept an additional student. That was both my experience as a student and later our policy when I was a professor.</p>
<p>Can't she just take Spanish Language classes without being a Spanish major or Minor?</p>
<p>CMU even runs sections of freshman English for the different schools so that they don't conflict with typical freshmen schedules.</p>