<p>This semester I was barely able to get into the classes I need and I'm worried that this might be repeated next semester too. So, do you get an earlier sign up date each semester? </p>
<p>thanks guys : )</p>
<p>generally yes. Your increasing status - units completed, school year - moves you towards the earlier signup dates. There is a random factor thrown in, so that while mostly seniors go before juniors, juniors before sophomores, etc and higher unit count advances someone inside their year range compared to others of the same class year, we do see anomalies and some overlap. You could end up having a few sophomores register before most juniors, but by and large your dates get earlier and earlier as you advance. It is the random factor that can hand you that "s**wed by telebears" semester, but also can give you a date much earlier than you otherwise warrant. Funny, but nobody posts a "given undue advantage by telebears" threads when the latter happens. </p>
<p>The other factor to consider is that the first few classes tend to be common for large groups of majors. Those are the classes with 500 or more in the main lecture. As you advance, you finish those up and move into mostly smaller classes that are not constrained. Cal doesn't have halls big enough to run all the giant lecture classes that lower classmen would want to attend, nor do most departments have enough grad students and faculty to cover that many in one semester. This eases off when lectures get down to a hundred or less and the choices in rooms goes way up. </p>
<p>I can pretty much guarantee that you won't get every class you want in the semester you want to take it, but also can very confidently state that with a bit of flexibility and smart planning you can get all the classes you need and a good portion of the ones you want as well while graduating at the end of four calendar years. You have to double/triple major, flounder around switching majors several times, or rigidly stick to a single sequence in order to take more than four calendar years. Summer session classes are an excellent way to get into very heavily oversubscribed courses, if you end up with a situation where slipping a key high demand class will delay your four year graduation. </p>
<p>In other words, you will often be anxious around registration time, you will certainly be jumping to plan B or plan C a lot, you may be sweating a waitlist for a week or two into a semester, but you will find that it works out well enough and you will relax more as the years go by.</p>