What are YOUR plans for First Semester Courses?

Dorian_Mode
Sat, 19 Jun 2010 04:52:24 +0000

O-Week is so crazy and jam-packed that there is barely time to think about courses.

Not if the people in charge are doing what they’re supposed to. I’m sorry to hear that your O-Week advising experience was mediocre, but the week is supposed to be evenly split between social and academic concerns. And, even if you have a less-than-helpful divisional advisor (which does happen, unfortunately), in my experience there are enough planning sessions and other periods of downtime built in to the schedule that no student should feel they haven’t had time to consider their various course options.

This is getting beside the point, though. I don’t think anyone expects new students to come in to O-Week without thinking ahead somewhat; after all, these are all highly-motivated kids who have worked very hard to get where they are. It is my opinion, though, that trying to plan out an actual schedule is excessive and possibly counter-productive. Since we have such intelligent, highly-motivated students, sometimes kids coming in with a concrete idea of what classes they think they need to take are less willing to listen to the good advice that they do receive, and this does not usually end well.

So, yeah. Look at the General Announcements, and think about what major path you might pursue. But do it in moderation.