Class waitlists: students talk perils of enrollment limbo

As enrollment ends for the fall semester, students anxiously wait to see if they get off of their class waitlists. EMILY PARIS, Staff Photographer

The time slowly inches closer as Gemma Marshall, a junior integrated educational studies (IES) major, waits for her assigned enrollment slot. Although she’s endured this process multiple times before, Marshall said it isn’t any less stressful by the time she is signing up for classes for her penultimate semester at Chapman. As the clock strikes 9:44pm, Marshall frantically hovers her mouse over the “refresh” button waiting through the final sixty seconds before her enrollment time.

“I've probably cried nearly every single one of my enrollments,” Marshall said. “But freshman and sophomore year were definitely the worst. I declared my major late, so I guess getting classes was a little bit easier (for me) when I was just enrolling in 101s. But it's never been particularly easy.”

Each semester, students are given an enrollment date and time determined by the amount of credits they have. For the fall and summer terms, enrollment takes place in April, whereas spring and interterm enrollment occurs in November. 

Using the StudentCenter website, which received a complete makeover March 13, students must undergo the cumbersome process of signing up for classes on a now-unfamiliar platform — at the end of which, they still might find themselves waitlisted. Essentially floating in enrollment limbo, Chapman students told The Panther the experience is both anxiety-inducing and frustrating.

On occasion, a major might have an effect on enrollment: this was the case for Janey Bonnifield, a sophomore IES major. Bonnifield told The Panther only a couple sections of each class are offered each semester for the IES major, making it difficult for students with later enrollment dates to register for certain courses.

Rather than feeling like a sitting duck on the waitlist, Bonnifield said it’s easier to wait it out and concede to taking the course the following semester.

“I feel like each semester gets easier, because with more credits, you're able to register earlier,” Bonnifield said. “But even now, there's classes that I want to take or even need to take that are just full. Because it is a small major, there's not a lot of sections offered for each class. So if you don’t get in, you have to wait a whole semester.”

The waitlist is often a stressful place where students feel hopeless about the unknown fate of their schedule, according to sophomore screen acting major Nicole Loika Wong.

“I think it causes anxiety to be on the waitlist for a class required for a major, especially if there's a lot of people signing up,” Wong said. “Because I have my four-year plan; I'm trying to take all the classes that I need to so that I can graduate on time. If you're on the waitlist and you never get off, you kind of have to reorient your entire schedule and figure out a way to make it work.”

On top of the pressure of enrolling, Chapman’s mid-semester update to the StudentCenter caused confusion among students inexperienced at navigating the new site. Marshall said although the website redesign came at an inconvenient time, she doubts she would have learned to navigate the site in preparation of enrollment if it had been announced sooner.

“Knowing myself, I probably wouldn't have even opened (the StudentCenter) until I needed to use it, regardless of when (the update) was (released),” Marshall said. “But I think if (Chapman) had sent out (how to use it) at the beginning of the semester, it would have been a little bit better — just so that when it did come time for enrollment, I wasn't trying to figure it out at the same time.”

Marshall, who has had a couple experiences being on a class waitlist, offers a piece of advice to those who are currently waitlisted and worried about their hazy schedules.

“It's almost better to wait until you have more credits and an earlier enrollment, (so you have) a better chance of getting into a class,” Marshall said. “But I also know that it's very stressful. Also talking to your academic advisors and the peer advisors can be helpful.”