Students are constantly being told withdrawing from a class and ending up with a “W” on a transcript looks bad. But how are we supposed to make decisions for classes if we don’t know what the workload is going to be or how the class will be structured?
Undergraduate Student Government and the University Technology Office have come up with a system that may make these blemishes on transcripts a thing of the past. The two have been working in concert to make course syllabi available for students to see online when they sign up for classes.
This new tool, should people utilize it, would potentially reduce the number of students who drop classes in the middle of the semester. By seeing the syllabus for each class, students can get a sense of the time commitment for each class they enroll in.
If one syllabus has the class reading a hundred pages a week, chances are you won’t want to pair that with a class that requires an essay a week. Such things may seem trivial, but to many students this makes all the difference. Many times assignments for classes come all at once rather than in doses.
On the same token, many students have jobs to balance on top of classes. So being able to create a work schedule for employers to see once the semester begins will be another good effect of this plan.
The potential also exists that this will help students avoid buying books that are unnecessary. We hear it all too often — students buy books for the semester and then get the syllabus on the first day of class only to find out none of the books they bought were required.
Students aren’t the only ones who will benefit from this either. Professors are not required to post the syllabi for their courses, but doing so would be beneficial — and probably help their rating on ratemyprofessor.com.
Those who do post the class’ syllabus will likely experience less hassle from students about dropping the class. This leaves more time for learning and less for annoying administrative tasks.
It will also force professors to be more prepared. Nothing is more frustrating than a vague syllabus with no concrete dates. Wonder when that paper is due or when the test is? If this online system goes into place, hopefully you can know even more before the class starts for the semester.
Perhaps the most surprising part of this entire new plan is that this is the brain child of USG, which has been a largely ineffective organization for campus this year. But if this plan is implemented next semester, USG will have had a noticeable impact on our campus.
This is a sound idea — everybody benefits from it. What beats us is that nobody thought of it sooner.
