Advice for Students Taking Composition Courses

When must students take their required composition courses?
As soon as possible.

Regulation J-3 requires that students take English 095, 101 or 102 each semester they are enrolled until they pass English 102. They should not postpone taking a composition course, even for one semester.


What to do if you can’t get into a section at a time that fits your schedule:

Use the wait-list system.

We register students in composition courses through the wait-list system and not by any other method (except under very unusual circumstances). Do not ask an instructor in English  101 or 102 to sign an add form; instructors are not permitted to sign add forms.

• You may wait list yourself for several different times, but it is unnecessary to wait list yourself for several sections that meet at the same time. All wait lists for courses that meet at the same time are combined into a single wait list, and students are added to the first open section at that time, which may not be the exact section for which you were wait listed.
• When you are added to a course through the wait-list system, you are automatically dropped from any other wait lists you were on for that course.
• It is unwise to wait list yourself for only one time if (a) the start of the semester is rapidly approaching or has already arrived or (b) the time selected is very popular. Early morning or later afternoon classes usually have openings.

General education courses are the most important courses for freshmen, so you should build your schedule around these courses. See further information about the wait-list system here.

If the semester has already begun: Wait list yourself for as many different times as your schedule will allow.

Don’t try at this point to arrange your schedule for maximum convenience; you may miss getting in the class altogether.

Do not go to classes or seek out individual instructors to get a signature on an add slip. Instead, wait list yourself for all the times at which you could take the course (not the same as the times you would prefer to take it).

Registration through the Web and the wait-list system operates 24 hours a day until midnight of the sixth day of classes (not counting weekends or holidays). There are a great number of new registrations occurring during this period, as well as section jumping (students dropping one section and adding another). Determined students who are willing to be flexible with their schedules can almost always add the course they want during this period. It is important, though, to select times that are less popular and not hold out for the perfect schedule.

Instructors will drop students for nonattendance during the first week of classes, and many students are added to courses through the wait lists by this method.

Check your VandalMail frequently! When you are registered for the course through the wait-list system, you are expected to appear in class as soon after as possible. You will receive an email from the wait-list system through your VandalMail, so you need to check your email several times a day. In addition, we in the English department may be trying to communicate with you.