In high school it was so easy. You'd make a list of all the subjects you wanted to do and the teachers would slave away and try to design a timetable that allowed most people to do all the subjects that they wanted to. The hardest choice you had was whether to do music or business!
At University it is a fine art! Do you want the tutorial before the lecture? A different day? All classes on two days? A long weekend? There are so many choices to make before you even consider the classes you are going to take!
This year is my fourth year but I feel like it is my first again. You see, until now I have lived on campus so I had a lot of flexibility. If I didn't get the ideal tutorial, it didn't matter because I'd be nearby at any time during the week. This year is a different story!
It's so difficult trying to find the perfect timetable! It doesn't help that by now it's easy for everyone else! I may have simplified things for myself by taking an external subject for International Relations but the Law subjects are frustrating. Of course the two lecture streams for my core courses are at awful times, with the tutorials either early in the morning or late at night!
My dilemma got me thinking over the basic rules I've set myself, not only this semester but in previous ones.
- No matter how long you spend telling yourself you will, you will not make it to your 8am lecture. If you do, you will be hating the lecturer, yourself, and life so much that you won't pay attention at all. If, by any chance, you do pay attention, it will be during the lecture where you watch Legally Blonde. (Yes this happened to me) This also applies to late classes.
- No matter how much you want to, you will not go to a class that involves you driving through traffic or walking a huge distance. Maybe you will, for a few weeks. Chances are, when assessment starts to pile up it will be too much effort. Say hello to lecture recordings.
- If you hate the room the class is scheduled in, you will look for excuses to skip. I actually haven't had this happen, although I check where tutorials are each semester before picking one. If a tutorial is on in a building or room I deteste, I will pick another one, even if it is the perfect time.
- Always pick an alternative tutorial that you won't mind. No matter how early you get onto the sign-on site, there will be at least one person who will beat you. Chances are, quite a few people will. Of course, when doing sign-on for non-law subjects you will usually find you are the first person to do so. It really says something about the motivation of law students.
- Consider taking Friday classes. I've only seen 4 or 5 Law tutorials scheduled for Fridays in my 4 years as a Law student and had to take one last year. I found it was great! It was a small class and the tutor, and other students were much more relaxed. It's a bonus that there are less people wanting to take the classes so they're easy to get into! Although a long weekend sounds great, if you take a 10am class you'll still be finished by 11am! HELLO WEEKEND!
So what are your personal rules and guidelines for picking classes?
Update: I managed to get all but one of my first choices! Thankfully I had my backup!
Update: I managed to get all but one of my first choices! Thankfully I had my backup!
Wow... that system sounds horribly complicated for the tutors - but GREAT for students! Speaking from my law school experience in the UK, it was much more rigidly timetabled with less choice. On the LPC, for instance, you had to choose your electives in advance. If there was too little interest in it to be viable to run, tough luck. Equally, you were constrained by what modules were timetabled together so some simply weren't compatible with one another.
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