[olePigeon]

So I'm finally graduating with a double degree in Liberal Arts and Graphic Design. That is, if I can get this sorted out. I've been checking up on my degree and making sure I'm on course and stuff, everything's looked good until I get my final requisition papers.

Says I'm 6 units short of my Design Degree. So I'm looking at the evaluation of my credits, and they stuck my 6 units in Electives.

So I have to go back and have them reclassify my class (or whatever they call it) to meet my design requirements.

Did I mention it took them 7 (yes SEVEN) tries to actually GET my transcripts from another college I was transferring from? They also f*cked up my ID card and never processed my lunch ID because they kept filing my god damn forms under my brother's file.

I'm cursed!!!

[zmcgill]

haha...degree in Liberal Arts. So do you draw or paint liberals?

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

haha...degree in Liberal Arts. So do you draw or paint liberals?

Well, I just don't like pictures of a Square or a Triangle. Conservative Arts is just too boring.

[Kerrigan]

i guess a degree in liberal media was out of the question?

seriously, what is a degree in liberal arts?

[hickey]

I know how hard it can be to get something fixed at a school run by people who probably never even went to college. It makes you question being there in the first place.

[fibroptikl]

Originally Posted by Kerrigan

seriously, what is a degree in liberal arts?

I wonder to.

[Agasthya]

Liberal arts and scienes.

This is what they were at UIUC: http://www.las.uiuc.edu/units/allunits.html

[ghporter]

I have attended NINE different colleges and universities (and in a week it'll be TEN), and one thing I've learned is that you can NEVER trust the school to just get things right. You MUST stay on top of them to make sure you get enrolled correctly, that your fees are properly credited, that your account works correctly, your network access is properly set up, and (most important) that your classes get credited the way they are supposed to be.

Add working with a third party for financing, whether it's a bank, a scholarship granter, or the VA, and you change to a higher level of difficulty and complexity. It's almost another major: Not Getting Screwed Over. Note that a lot of this has to do with work-study students who are often well-meaning but under-trained and under-supervised. And of course there are a few who are just no good at anything.

My only real hint: start looking at things before class starts, even before registration is over. If there's anything out of place, identify it to the right office IMMEDIATELY. If it's early, it's often easier to correct.

[FireWire]

Originally Posted by hickey

I know how hard it can be to get something fixed at a school run by people who probably never even went to college. It makes you question being there in the first place.

I'm wondering the same thing. I had to miss 3 whole semesters on 3 separate occasions because my college messed up some things. The first time, they sent a letter saying they couldn't accept me because I had not completed my admission exam... the same day they sent me my results of the said exam! Of course, it was "too late" (too much hassle for them?) to enroll me once they acknowledged their miskate.

The second time, their computer thought my GPA had dropped below the minimum level and they expelled me from my program, only to realize, too late, that they messed up again. The third time, I sent my application by mail well before the deadline, but their website indicated the wrong date for my program, so I was, in fact, a bit late for the postal application. "Fine, I said, I still have until tomorrow to file it online - No, you can't do that"

[mindwaves]

Yeah, you always have to keep on top of things. I have been cleared for graduation this June for my MS EE and I thought everything was ok until a week ago, I called to confirm the spelling of my name on the commencement list and they said that my name was not even on the list! So that led to a couple of more calls and my name being eventually added.

[ghporter]

Harried and stressed a week out is ALWAYS better than frantic and insane two hours out. Good work, mindwaves!

I'm in the enviable position of moving from one University of Texas school to another. It seems that, except for the name they don't share a whole lot. At least there's no weird rivalry between the two.

[Kerrigan]

So far nobody has figured out what a major in 'liberal arts' is (and yes we all know what liberal arts are, that's not the point)

[Millennium]

When I graduated college, I turned out to be one elective short as well. The error had gotten through three rounds of checking in my department (Computer Science), two rounds over at the Liberal Arts department, and got all the way to the final certification board before they caught the error. They sent it back to the CS department without saying why, and it took them another three days to find the error. Needless to say, by then I was already gone. I decided to have some fun with this, though, since it turned out to be a free elective: pretty much literally anything I wanted. The local community college had a course in private investigation that looked like fun, so I took that, transferred it into my degree program, and got the degree that way.

That kind of option isn't for everyone, of course, but you might want to at least consider the basic principle. If they're going to stick you with one frickin elective, you may as well have some fun with it.

[brassplayersrock²]

good luck with everything olePigeon, i'm sure everything will work out for the best.

edit: Millenium, was the private investigation course as fun as it looked? what kind of things did you do in the class?

[zmcgill]

Originally Posted by olePigeon

Well, I just don't like pictures of a Square or a Triangle. Conservative Arts is just too boring.

The question was not what you draw or paint, but whether you draw OR paint.

[Miniryu]

Wow. What schools did all of you attend? I went to Brown- I didn't have any problems of the such. Maybe I got lucky.

[FireWire]

Originally Posted by Miniryu

Wow. What schools did all of you attend? I went to Brown- I didn't have any problems of the such. Maybe I got lucky.

The Université de Montréal, the second largest French-speaking university in the world.



Large map of the campus
Another map (color)

[Dakar]

Originally Posted by brassplayersrock

good luck with everything olePigeon, i'm sure everything will work out for the best.

WDlove is that you?

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Kerrigan

i guess a degree in liberal media was out of the question?

seriously, what is a degree in liberal arts?

English, foreign languages, and communication for me.

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Gossamer

The question was not what you draw or paint, but whether you draw OR paint.

Yes. I'm not so much into fine arts, though, which I'm actually not too happy with myself over. It's just that everything is focused on computers these days. There were a lot of people who are absolutely amazing with Photoshop, but couldn't pick up a pencil and draw a circle if their life depended on it.

Originally Posted by Miniryu

Wow. What schools did all of you attend? I went to Brown- I didn't have any problems of the such. Maybe I got lucky.

CSU Sacramento. I would highly recommend people avoid. I got an offer for UC Davis but I can't afford the tuition.

[CharlesS]

eh, never mind

[ghporter]

Florida State was the least friendly/helpful for me, but it wasn't really their fault. I was attending courses at Albrook AFS in Panama and somehow the registrar just didn't figure out that certain class sections were not in Talahassee. I got a nice letter about how I was supposed to go to the Registrar's office to discuss something (somehow the mailing address being an APO just didn't register with them), so I had to explain it to them in a return letter. They wrote back "oh, that's right, nevermind," as if they knew it all along.

The University of Southern Mississippi turned out to be the easiest and smoothest for me. I attended their Long Beach campus, which was almost an extension campus from the main one in Hattiesburg. Beautiful views of the beach, a fantastic live oak in the front court called "Friendship Oak," and a staff that was actually on campus after 5pm (helpful since all (I mean ALL) my classes had to be evening/night classes) made things easier than the local community college (MGCCC, where Pres Bush just gave the commencement address).

The University of Texas system is, let's say, different. The system owns so much oil land in west Texas that they could join OPEC if there was an advantage in it for the schools. They don't care, they don't have to-they're UT. But here in San Antonio, the two big schools, UT San Antonio and UT Health Science Center at San Antonio, have been great. Just a little overly officious and more complex than needed.

Oh, I should mention my one class at Eastern Michigan University. It was what would be called "dual credit" or "advanced placement" today. It was also a cool way to get to go to a real university while a senior in high school. I got a nice, solid B. This was absolutely the EASIEST college I ever registered for; the high school did almost all the work, so all I had to do was get some forms filled out and my parent's signatures.