Registration Frustration

By Ana Reynolds Last updated Apr 26, 2024

Think you are balding? It’s likely post-registration hair loss! PHOTO CREDIT: ALDEN TIMM ’25

St. Lawrence University course registration left many students stressed and frustrated about their schedules for the upcoming school year. Classes are filling up faster than ever, especially in the science departments, causing students to worry about fulfilling their major requirements with the lack of availability. Additionally, many students are forced into a five-day schedule due to the school’s push for more Friday classes. 

Jerianne Stephens ’27, a biomedical student at SLU, noted her stress levels increasing during course registration due to the shortage of seats in certain courses. “The current system does cause me stress,” she said. “A lot of the classes that I’m registering for get filled up pretty quickly, especially cell biology, so it was important for me to stay on top of my time slot for that. It can be tricky.” 

Many students believe the system for registering is unfair and inconvenient. “I don’t really think it is a fair system,” said Caroline Moran ’27. “Over the summer, I had a four p.m. time slot, and I wasn’t able to register for that time because I was working.” Moran suggested increasing the length of the time slots, especially in the summer for first-year registration, so that students are not stressed about registering for their required classes if they are unable to enroll at their assigned time.

Samantha Glazier, chair of the chemistry department at SLU, believes that not only her students but college students everywhere are experiencing anxiety with meeting course requirements for their majors. “I think just kind of with the way that the world is right now, anxiety levels are just sort of high in general, and so there is more of a tendency to do what you are supposed to be doing sort of as defined by filling requirements,” she said. “I wish there was a way to alleviate students’ stress when they’re looking for classes.”

Glazier feels the chemistry department ensures that its students are able to register for their required courses, but acknowledges that other departments pose registering issues for students. “We have these health and humanities courses, and a lot of the classes don’t let seniors in,” she said. “Many will save those courses till their senior year because they are like, oh, that will be fun and interesting, and then they can’t get in because seniors aren’t allowed.”

Besides chemistry, Glazier has a strong interest in the study abroad programs and has noticed many situations where students worry they will not be able to go abroad if they do not complete a certain amount of required courses beforehand. “I am really passionate about study abroad, so I just wish there was a way to reduce some of the barriers,” she said. “I think that would be partly working with students and kind of map out what’s possible.” 

Students are not only stressed about enrolling in their courses but they are also frustrated with the school’s push for more Friday classes, which Glazier notes will affect not only the students but the departments as well. “It was indicated to department chairs that, essentially, we had to offer Friday classes,” she said. “In some departments, like mine, we’ve always had them, so there was no change for us, but a lot of departments never had them.”

Due to students’ increasing stress about class availability and unexpectedly longer schedules with the push for more Friday classes, many people have suggested a change in the way students register, but Glazier disagrees. “One thing about St. Lawrence is I feel that people who make these kinds of decisions really do try to make considered, thoughtful, fair decisions,” she said. “They probably looked at all of the options and were like, okay, this isn’t perfect, but it’s the best we can do.” 

The Associate Registrar at SLU, Darrcy Waugh, emphasizes that the Registrar’s Office is working hard to ensure students can register for the courses they need. “We are really working hard on projecting and essentially seeing how many students are in which major and how many courses we are going to need to for these students to select from, and be able to have enough for everybody,” she said. “We’re working at it every semester to make sure that we have as many classes as possible, and our department chairs also work really hard at that, too.”