Students will be able to register for Experimental College courses using Student Information System (SIS) starting next semester.
This option was not available to students last semester. Previously, students signed up for ExCollege offerings on a list or on Tufts Webcenter, and then could attend the first class to decide if they wanted to enroll. If space for a class was limited, the final roster decision would fall to the professor.
"In the past, we've had people sign up for classes but not really register," ExCollege Director Robyn Gittleman said. "It was not on a first-come, first-serve basis. You had an equal chance of getting into the course if your name was on the list."
Yet this turned out to be a complicated process. "Many classes had as many as 60 people sign up even if they had to get down to 20 or 30 people," she said. Professors "had their own reasons" for choosing some students over others, she said.
Gittleman said that the ExCollege Board decided to remove this element based on feedback from students.
Students will be able to add ExCollege courses during the add/drop period when they can adjust other elements of their schedule.
"The registrar was very happy that we made this choice," Gittleman said. "We discussed for a number of weeks what this meant and how it was going to affect the students. We hope that everyone will be able to get the classes that they want, and that the instructors will know who is in the class and be able to start with a little less fluctuation."
Which is not to say the problem of entering and exiting students will go away entirely.
Phil Primack, who has taught in the ExCollege in the past and will offer a course entitled Media, Law and Ethics this spring, still expects the class to fluctuate even with a more sophisticated add/drop procedure.
"It's very, very hard to establish a good class chemistry," when students can still enter the class for two weeks afterwards and drop for four weeks afterward, he said.
But ExCollege registration will still take place at the beginning of the semester, not with regular course registration several months before.
Opening ExCollege registration this early would present a major logistical challenge, ExCollege board member and junior Alejandro Pi?±ero said.
The board is still soliciting and deciding upon course proposals to be taught throughout the semester and currently cannot announce the offerings in time for regular SIS registration.
If introduced earlier, Pi?±ero said, ExCollege offerings could see an increase in popularity, as they could be considered when students make their general course selection.
The ExCollege courses will be open for registration from Jan. 17 to Feb. 21 and will have a typical class size of 25 to 30 students with a waitlist of up to 10 students, Gittleman said.
Gittleman said that the decision to switch to SIS is a pilot program, and the student response will affect whether it will continue.
"I think that people will take the class more seriously when they register. But we won't have as much flexibility as before, because large numbers of people can't get in," Gittleman said.
ExCollege courses for Spring 2007 will soon be voted on and will be listed on its Web site by mid-December, she said.
Marc Raifman contributed reporting for this article.
