JORDAN PATTERSON
Staff Writer
The Fredonia campus can take a deep breath now, as advising week has passed.
With confusion and stress in their minds, students look to their advisers for assistance. While hoping to get the most of their education in a timely manner, that is not what always ends up happening. Students are frequently locked out classes due to multiple factors. Sometimes the course is simply not offered that particular semester or the class does not have enough seats available. No matter how common of an obstacle this can be, it is an obstacle that some students have to overcome.
For Academic Affairs and the Registrar’s Office, it’s about balancing the classes students want to take and the classes students need to take. Dr. Terry Brown, provost and vice president of Academic Affairs, stated she believes that it’s not a common issue.
“We’ve really worked hard over the last couple of years to make sure that we’re providing students courses on time for them to complete their degree in four years,” said Brown. “We can’t offer every course every semester, because we’re trying to manage our offerings so that we are able to manage our costs so that we don’t pass on the bill to the students. We’re trying to keep tuition and fees affordable to students.”
She then introduced her Course Scheduling Task Force, a team that designs advising with students’ needs in mind. Part of this team is Associate Provost for Curriculum, Assessment & Academic Support Lisa Hunter and Scott Saunders from the Registrar’s Office.
“It’s not a one-to-one service … if you need the course that semester and that’s only one student, we’re balancing that against the entire demand of the population,” Hunter stated.
Saunders emphasized that they have been focusing on balancing needs and wants.
“When it comes down to individual students, we have the idea of the need versus the want, and we’ve got a lot of projects,” said Saunders. “A lot of tools are currently being investigated, implemented and researched to handle both of those situations.”
All three faculty members concurred that this year’s advising has gone smoothly so far. While acknowledging that some students get left out of classes in a particular semester, it boils down to what’s the most efficient and cost effective for the school.
The feelings from students about advising are hit or miss.
Senior Bachelor of Fine Arts sculpture major Julian Perez said, “When I was an incoming transfer student, my adviser was extremely helpful in supplying me the information needed to switch to a visual arts degree. He made sure I understood the portfolio review process, contacted the department head to discuss issues and even contacted me to assure I got accepted into the program, which I thought was a very sweet gesture.”
While having nothing but good things to say about the advising process, Perez recognized the troubles other students have with registering for classes.
“There is an unfortunate amount of students who don’t get into mandatory classes because the time in which they can register is so late in the week,” said Perez. “I was lucky enough to be able to register first thing Monday morning, but a few of my friends need to wait to take classes they need to graduate because of their given times.”
Senior public relations and applied music double major Kristen Becker, who has had trouble with advising in the past, said, “[Advisors] lead you in the right direction and sometimes class selection is out of their control. They know what you have to take, but they cannot control what you can physically get into … It is frustrating when a class is mandatory for a major, and they do not have enough seats for the students that need to take the classes. Some students are seniors and have to get into the class to graduate.”
While recognizing the minor faults in the system, Brown and the Course Scheduling Task Force look to the future by laying out their plans to improve on an already solid system.
“We’re using 21st century tools to help our students graduate on time,” said Brown.