Students are strongly encouraged by almost every level of Green River to map out their classes so they have a plan for their graduation. Counselors use the degree planning worksheets, students spend hours planning out their classes alone, and some teachers even give warning when a successive class will or won’t be offered.
While this is obviously a rather important aspect of graduating on time and with the right classes for each student’s degree, the lack of future schedules makes planning any further than a single quarter extremely difficult, and sometimes impossible altogether.
There are hundreds upon hundreds of classes listed in the annual catalog, though there is no mention of when these classes are offered on campus. Quarterly schedules will give a symbol telling students this class is only offered for this quarter, but there is no advanced warning of this before those schedules are printed out each quarter.
If Green River was to put those same symbols in the annual catalog, showing each quarter a class was offered, students would be better prepared to map out their degree plans ahead of time. While it is understandable that occasionally these symbols will be incorrect, especially considering the massive budget cuts that are being tossed around legislation right now, having a general idea of what is offered, and when, would make things easier for students.
Having only a few weeks notice each quarter of what will be offered in the coming quarter is not long enough. Getting schedules out should be put on a shorter deadline so that students will have more time to decide before their registration time comes along.
While students are the largest benefactor of this change, faculty and staff would also have an easier go of it. Fewer students would need to make repetitive meetings with counselors, more faculty would be able to plan around how many students they will have for the following quarter. Even administration could benefit by seeing what classes are filling the fastest. Being able to add even one class hour to a group that is already full gives another 30 students the chance to take the class.
Considering the unlimited positive changes that printing quarterly schedules earlier and giving students a heads up on when classes are offered would make, it’s hard to see why these changes haven’t been put into effect yet. Hopefully, it’s simply because no one thought to say something about it until…Now.
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