Every semester, students complain that they didn't get into the classes they requested. The Office of the Registrar, however, asserts that this is normal.
"It happens every year," said Registrar and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs Ken Kirkpatrick. "The numbers weren't really out of the normal [range]. Usually the people who didn't get any classes who were eligible to register is less than two percent."
Some students are ineligible to register for classes because they have holds on their accounts for not paying their tuition or other fines on their accounts. For many students, however, it is just the luck of when their requests are processed in the system.
This semester, the last group of students who had their course request sheet processed included students with last names S-Z. First-year Jack Sampson fell in this group.
"I requested seven classes and didn't get into any of them," Sampson said. "At first I thought [the system] was broken. And then I called [the Registrar's office] and they told me to click the link at the top right and it showed that I hadn't been enrolled in any of them. Basically [the office] then said 'Well, you're on your own.'"
After hearing the Registrar's office response to his dilemma, Sampson emailed several professors to try to get on the wait list for their classes.
"From there, I emailed my advisor who was teaching one of the computer science classes I wanted and he got me on the wait list,"Sampson said. "I sent out like four or five emails about classes to see if I could get on their wait lists."
He got on three wait lists and was able to pick up two history classes he wanted because they were open.
Sampson thinks the main problem is that DePauw doesn't offer enough classes that are in high demand for students.
Kirkpatrick agrees with this, but says it is hard for DePauw to hire part-time professors to teach just one or two classes that are in high demand.
"If there's huge demand [for a course] then sometimes we've been about to add one," Kirkpatrick said. "Though unlike a lot of schools we don't really have a real ready pool of part time instructors."
Some courses that have a high demand with students are Introduction to Spanish and economics courses.
"Largely it's with Spanish 140, that course that if you don't test out of Spanish, but you've studied it that you have to take in order to complete the language requirement," Kirkpatrick said. "There just seems like a lot more students who are in that situation than we have courses for. In those cases, it's usually best to talk to the instructor or the department chair."
First-year Danielle Dattilio experienced problems getting into Spanish 140 first hand.
"It's frustrating that I was in the first priority for class requests and had the 140 Spanish class as my very first choice and still couldn't get in," Dattilio said.
Although there can be many problems that arise with selecting courses, the Registrar's office sends out emails to all students about how to choose classes wisely. The Registrar's office advises students to make sure that they are eligible for the courses that they are requesting and that there are no time conflicts with other courses.