@ProfessorPlum168 Depends on your kid’s waitlist number and the total section. But I generally say stay with it.
I’ve seen plenty of cases that the class will modify the total enrollment, including lab sections, if no one ends up dropping.
What an ordeal for registration with all the waiting. I’m glad I was watching and not the one registering. Only thing waitlisted for my kid is the lab for EE16A. Weird how all the lab times disappeared (put on waitlist status) in real time. The EE classes should have done what the CS classes have done and go to 999 times for lab and discussion.
Also it was weird that the Data 8 lecture itself went to Waitlist at one point back to Open as well.
Question - on CalCentral it shows the EE16A entire class as being waitlisted even though only the lab is waitlisted. Is this normal? How does one know how far down on the waitlist they are?
@ProfessorPlum168 As far as I know, if you are waitlisted in the section or lab, then you are not officially in the class even though the class may have open seats. I am from Telebears generation which showed the exact waitlist number, so I’m not too familiar with the new website which doesn’t show your waitlist number. But if you are able to view the waitlist number for the lab, then that is what matters.
What a pain, you are right. After consultation with EECS, he had to drop and add the class with a lab that was open, in order for the lecture to be registered. No way to only waitlist for a lab which makes no sense. Unfortunately by the time we figured this out, the only lab that was open was Friday night and he teaches a class on Fridays. What a scheduling nightmare.
If anything, I would periodically check for the lab section that he wants to be enrolled, especially once the school begins. There will be folks dropping, and there might be a temporary opening and quickly weasel in.
Once you get used to the system after a few semesters, then you can pull off my style by remaining on the waitlist for the sections I want and just wait. The waitlist issue must be resolved at some point, and the class can’t force-drop me either, so I always found a way to get into the sections I want later in college.
@ProfessorPlum168 I just looked into your EE16A
http://classes.berkeley.edu/content/2018-fall-eleng-16a-001-lec-001
it seems that labs on Monday, Tuesday and Thursday are opened. None of those will work for your son, instead of Friday?
My son managed to get all his four classes, at the end. Again big thanks to administration and advisers at the Math Department. They fix things very efficiently.
@ProfessorPlum168 I think I may have a theory about those wait lists for EE16A LABs. My son , at some point of today, ended up waitlisted for a class with a significant number of open seats. However, the categories of people these seats were “reserved” for, were messed up a bit. After CalCentral came back to life today, the waitlist was processed and he got into the class. But for the waitlist to be processed, they had to fix those categories of “reserved”. Looking at you class/lab, I think that in the upcoming days, after the “reserved” tag will fully disappear, the waitlists will be processed. If the number of people on the waitlist is smaller than the total open seats (which are not available now due to various “reservations”), the whole wait list will end up enrolled. No guarantee here, I am just making conclusions from my observations of today’s mess. Bottom line - hold tight. It may be that in a few days (definitely by the time the adjustment period is about to start) this mess will clear up, and your son will get what he wants…
Well my kid panicked when the number of open seats for freshmen for the EE16A class started dwindling down close to single digits which is why he decided to drop the class and readd with the horrible Lab class time. But there hopefully will be good news soon - the EE department says that they most likely will add a few more labs next week. My only fear is that by dropping and reading the class, the lecture itself would then get waitlisted. EE should have done what CS did and made all the labs and discussions a 999 section to avoid this drop and readd nightmare.
@ElenaParent the M and W labs that are left won’t work because he’a got a 1pm lecture. The Tuesday one might work but then he would have to go straight from 9:30 to 2pm and perhaps longer with no break. That may be an option though.
@UpMagic @ucbalumnus @ProfessorPlum168 does anyone know when the Spring 2019 schedule of classes comes out? Various websites give October 1 for the time of availability of sign-up appointments, and October 15 as the sign up date for Phase 1. But when will the kids be able to see what classes are available in the spring? It may help in planning class “add/drop/swap” during the first two weeks of the fall semester - helps to see what’s offered next time around, and plan… But I guess the schedule for Spring is not available that early, huh?
@ElenaParent The last time I was there it was at least 2 weeks before the sign-up date meaning late September or first thing in October. Just as much as you are doing all the course searches and schedule planning now, ideally the same amount of time and effort should be put in for next semester. It’s not so convenient since it’s in middle of the semester and there are classes to attend and problem sets to finish, but it’s gotta be done.
Depending on the department, it may already announce tentative schedule like the mechanical engineering department, so check the department website and see if there’s any good info out there.
http://www.me.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/undergraduate/Schedule.pdf
@ProfessorPlum168 - as the Phase 2 rolled in, your favorite class is getting weirder and weirder.
http://classes.berkeley.edu/content/2018-fall-eleng-16a-001-lec-001
DIS with zero enrollment limit (I guess kids will spill into this from the “999”). A new LAB early on Friday opened, I believe. And the wait-list is now much much more than the class’s capacity… Can you shed some light, if you know? The reason I am interested is that I have another son, who might be interested in Berkeley, in CS to be precise, he is a raising HS Senior. I am learning the ropes of the CS now…
@ElenaParent THANK YOU so much for letting us know about the new labs! The EE department was “supposed” to notify us when labs were added but they never did. Looks like they added about 4 new labs for EE16A. My kid switched to a Tuesday night one. Not all that ideal, he’ll have 5 hours between classes but that’s fine. Beats being there Friday night.
The waitlist for that class is almost all upperclassmen. There should still be spots for incoming freshmen and new transfers. The class is supposed to be designed as a Linear Algebra + circuit design class for freshmen.
You mean why the waitlist max is 500 when there are already 762 people enrolled as of right now?
The 150 Wheeler auditorium’s capacity is actually below 750 so not only there shouldn’t be any waitlist at all, but also the enrollment cap should be fewer than 950.
On the first day of class, there will be some people in inconvenience sitting on the floor or other uncomfortable setting, but I can assure you there will be much greater than 10% of the people dropping out. Hopefully webcast will also be offered and it will be a relatively empty space by the second lecture.
http://www.dailycal.org/2013/09/02/increased-cs-course-demand-leads-to-overflowing-auditorium/
It happened before, and it was addressed in one way or another.
All the big CS classes (61A/B/C) plus EE16A and Data8 and Data100 are hosted in Wheeler 150. CS61A has a max of 1700 and I’ll bet it’ll be close to max. My kid has 3 classes there and I’m assuming that there will be webcasts for all the classes there.
They took apart all the seats in 150 over the summer, so I wonder if the new configuration will have more seating or not.
Fascinating… @UpMagic, thank you. And what do upperclassmen are doing, sitting on the wait-list of EE16A, @ProfessorPlum168 ? Why, what do they need from this class?
@ElenaParent I think the issue is that for CS/EECS majors and other associated majors, the EE16A/EE16B sequence is required and/or a perfectly good substitute for Math 54. However, people can’t get to EE16A until they have finished Math 1A/1B, and for a lot of folks that’s not until their sophomore or junior years.
If you look at MechE for example, EE16B counts as a technical elective which means there could be upperclassmen taking it.
I have a question about signing up… @ucbalumnus, @ProfessorPlum168, @UpMagic, or anyone else who knows, may be you can help? What’s the appropriate thing to do? My son is on wait list in MATH198BC, Session 002, position #5. There is a sister-session 001 (there are total of two sections in 198BC), and the length of wait list there is 3. Probability-wise, he may have a better chance of getting on in session 001, but he is attending session 002. Would it be acceptable, per customs, school policy, etc. to also get onto wait list of session 001 and see if he can get through the wait list there? Of course, it would involve talking to both session leaders (professors or grad students/TAs), and if everybody is fine with it, switch to session 001 by dropping out of 002? This is a P/NP, 1 unit course. Berkeley Connect… Thanks!