Waiting List Policies - Alyson McLamore

QUESTIONS STUDENTS ASK ME:

1) What are the chances I will get to enroll in your class if I are on the waiting list?

On the first day of class, I am always willing to add students -- usually 2-3 people, and perhaps more if there are no-shows among the people who were already registered. (There are usually some drops as the quarter progresses, so the room becomes less over-crowded after the first week, thereby bringing the enrollment back down to the official room capacity. Frankly I am counting on some drops, so the fire marshall does not get upset at the over-enrollment.)

Your chances of being added are excellent if you are a music major or minor. When adding students, I give the highest priority to people who need the class because it is part of their required curriculum (i.e., Music Majors and Minors, and in a few cases Theater and Liberal Studies students). If you are a music major or minor, please put your name on the official waiting list. If you cannot add yourself to the waiting list for some reason, then please contact me via email (amclamor@calpoly.edu) as soon as possible, so that I am aware of your desire/need to take the class. It helps me to give other students a more realistic idea about their chances of being able to register for the class.

Your chances are very good if you're high on the waiting list. After accommodating any music majors and minors, it is my habit to honor the waiting list that is "frozen" at the end of the open registration period. So, if you were signed up for the waiting list before the enrollment period ends, your chances are very good that you will get added if you are among the top 2-3 people on the list—and even people further down the list can sometimes be accommodated, if higher-ranked people don't show up on the first day.

Note: It is an unfortunate reality of our current registration system that the wait-list seems to "vanish" at the end of open enrollment. Actually, it becomes invisible only to students. The lists ARE still accessible for faculty, so don't despair if it seems like you were dropped from the wait-list --it's still there, deep within the system. I will be using the frozen list to guide my enrollment priorities each quarter.

It is possible that you can get into the class simply by coming to the first class meeting. If you are not on the waiting list, you might still be able to crash the class if you show up the first day, since sometimes there are multiple students who are no-shows, both from the registered list and the waiting list. For the "walk-up" students, the order of priority is as follows:

1) graduating seniors (please bring a copy of your senior evaluation for verification)

2) seniors

3) juniors

Currently, all the courses I teach are upper-division, so freshmen and most sophomores are not officially eligible to enroll. I am willing to work with advanced sophomores who meet all the course prerequisites and who have an excellent GPA, but it is best to discuss the enrollment with me ahead of time to make sure that you understand the course's demands (my classes are not considered to be "easy"!) Moreover, any upper-division student wanting to take my class must also meet the required prerequisites, especially any writing and/or music theory requirements. It is unlikely that the computer will allow you to enroll if you have not taken the required prerequisites, but if you should slip through the cracks somehow, do yourself a favor and drop the class and find something else that fits your schedule, rather than waiting until the first week of classes when the selection of open courses becomes very, very limited.

2) What are my chances of enrolling after the first class meeting?

Slim! Since my classes meet two times a week, you've missed half of a week if you are absent the first day. There is always lecture material covered during the first class meeting, so you are already behind. Historically, people who miss the first day tend to do significantly more poorly in the class, since they missed the introductory vocabularly, the detailed clarification of the syllabus and course expectations, and were automatically behind in the reading assignments (and there are always reading assignments . . .) I would add a student after the first day only if all the following conditions are met:

1) The room capacity has not been exceeded

2) You have a very good friend in the class who can work with you to review the "missed" material.

3) You arewilling to attend one of my office hours the first week so that I can review the syllabus and course expectations

4) You have a demonstrable "need" for the course (a graduating senior who lacks a C.4, a financial aid student who hasn't reached the 12-unit minimum, etc.)

5) Your course load is not exceptionally heavy (no 20-unit loads!). My classes always require work, and students don't do well in my courses when they are over-extended by their other courses or work schedule

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