Arfi Hagi Yusuf | Features Editor
Featured illustration by Jasmine Wiradharma (Comics and Graphics Editor)
Practice makes perfect, right? Or so you would think. As a fourth-year student at York, I was no stranger to the schedule-making process, and as a seasoned professional, I prepared myself weeks in advance in making the most immaculate schedule with the perfect blend of electives, course requirements and bird courses. All the mistakes I had made in the last three years had finally been remedied and I was ready to kill my fourth and final year—at least the schedule.
I’ll probably never forget the date of June 9, 2016: the day that my course selection opened up. The warning signs were everywhere. My allotted time slot to start enrolling in courses was at 5 p.m. and of course, it wasn’t until nearly 5:13 p.m. that it opened for me.
The class you were trying to add are reserved
Regardless, I knew the classes I needed, so I began to enrol and I ran into my first problem: the classes I was trying to add were reserved. These were classes in my program, for fourth-year students that I had the prerequisites for. As I proceeded to add more courses, I came across more problems, being told by the program that I didn’t have prerequisites and classes were full.
I began adding courses that I had no interest in to at least give my schedule some shape. From countless appointments with my program director, emails to professors and even to going to the Bennett Centre as a last resort, I was told the same answer: I would have to wait out the first few weeks and get special permissions from professors or hope for someone to drop those courses. York administration may find this a reasonable answer, but as a fourth-year student, it wasn’t ideal. Don’t even get me started on how difficult pleading with professors and advisors to join courses has been.
They say if it ain’t broke don’t fix it. Well this is broke. In fact, it is very broken and it’s time that we fix it. Although this isn’t an isolated problem, if students in the GTA and its surrounding areas find themselves in similar predicaments, it is not to this degree. Students from the University of Waterloo and Ryerson University can enjoy a 100 per cent refund for courses up until the third or second week of school, respectively. Even U of T students enjoy a few more days of getting a full refund over York students.
Despite all of this, students at these schools experience similar stresses and problems. Having their schedules created for them, limited time and day slots for prerequisites or classes filling up beyond their capacities within a blink of an eye are all problems students face. There is no reason why students should be crowding around program advisors in the first few weeks of school, pleading their cases to get into classes—as if they aren’t paying money for them. It isn’t fair for professors to have to turn down students—or string them on with false hope of getting into their courses.
In the past, there was a call to action for the eradication of the yearly $300 deposit for York students upon enrolling in courses which yielded positive results. So why not mend this inefficient system? The resources are available but there needs to be action behind this anger. A change needs to happen for both my sake and the sake of the York community. And so I beg you, York administration, please fix this.
Sincerely, a fourth-year student who just wants to get the hell out.
