2008 Woodie Awards
Waitlists circumvent essential interaction
Editorial
The Editorial Board
Issue date: 9/1/06 Section: Opinion
- Page 1 of 1
As the last day of add/drop, yesterday marked the close of another registration season. Yesterday also ended the second semester of one the University's newest experiments: electronic course waitlists.
In theory, waitlists equalize and streamline the registration process. Rather than relying on the haphazard pink-slip method, which required students to contact their professors individually, waitlists create a defined roster of all students who are interested in a class. Students can complete the entire registration process through the TigerPaws Web site and never need to trek to the Office of the Registrar or track down professors.
Furthermore, professors have the option of objectively choosing which students to admit into their classes based on these students' rankings on the waitlist. The pink-slip process depended completely on the subjective whims of individual professors who chose whether to sign students' pink-slips.
However, the key words here are "in theory." Waitlists are really just as subjective as pink-slips; professors can change students' rankings on the waitlists and admit whomever they want into their classes. Furthermore, waitlists add this level of personal bias without forcing students to communicate with their professor at all.
The waitlists turn requesting to take a closed class into pushing yet another button on the TigerPaws Web site. Under the pink-slip system, a student had to take the individual initiative to seek a professor out.
Pink-slips made it absolutely necessary for students to talk to a professor if they wanted to take his or her class after it had reached its maximum capacity. Students had to e-mail, call or set up a face-to-face meeting with a professor and plead their cases. This way, professors could hear all the reasons why individual students wanted to be admitted into their classes, and they could make informed decisions based on these reasons.
For example, a senior who needs to take a required class so he or she can graduate should naturally take precedence over a first year who wants to take a class to fulfill a Common Curriculum requirement. Under the waitlist system, an uninterested professor can just glance at his or her waitlist rankings and never investigate students' reasons for requesting to take his or her classes.
The pink-slip system adds a necessary level of subjectivity to the registration process. While we appreciate the efforts of University to simplify and equalize registration through waitlists, students need to be able to plead their cases when trying to register for a closed class.
Trinity prides itself on student-professor interaction. For the most part, the University's small student population and low student-to-professor ratio ensures that students at Trinity never become numbers in the eyes of the administration. However, the waitlist system does just that by taking away the essential student-professor communication inherent in the pink-slip process.
The University needs to eschew simplification in favor of communication in this case. Pink-slips are a necessary hassle that ensure that the right students end up in the right classes.
In theory, waitlists equalize and streamline the registration process. Rather than relying on the haphazard pink-slip method, which required students to contact their professors individually, waitlists create a defined roster of all students who are interested in a class. Students can complete the entire registration process through the TigerPaws Web site and never need to trek to the Office of the Registrar or track down professors.
Furthermore, professors have the option of objectively choosing which students to admit into their classes based on these students' rankings on the waitlist. The pink-slip process depended completely on the subjective whims of individual professors who chose whether to sign students' pink-slips.
However, the key words here are "in theory." Waitlists are really just as subjective as pink-slips; professors can change students' rankings on the waitlists and admit whomever they want into their classes. Furthermore, waitlists add this level of personal bias without forcing students to communicate with their professor at all.
The waitlists turn requesting to take a closed class into pushing yet another button on the TigerPaws Web site. Under the pink-slip system, a student had to take the individual initiative to seek a professor out.
Pink-slips made it absolutely necessary for students to talk to a professor if they wanted to take his or her class after it had reached its maximum capacity. Students had to e-mail, call or set up a face-to-face meeting with a professor and plead their cases. This way, professors could hear all the reasons why individual students wanted to be admitted into their classes, and they could make informed decisions based on these reasons.
For example, a senior who needs to take a required class so he or she can graduate should naturally take precedence over a first year who wants to take a class to fulfill a Common Curriculum requirement. Under the waitlist system, an uninterested professor can just glance at his or her waitlist rankings and never investigate students' reasons for requesting to take his or her classes.
The pink-slip system adds a necessary level of subjectivity to the registration process. While we appreciate the efforts of University to simplify and equalize registration through waitlists, students need to be able to plead their cases when trying to register for a closed class.
Trinity prides itself on student-professor interaction. For the most part, the University's small student population and low student-to-professor ratio ensures that students at Trinity never become numbers in the eyes of the administration. However, the waitlist system does just that by taking away the essential student-professor communication inherent in the pink-slip process.
The University needs to eschew simplification in favor of communication in this case. Pink-slips are a necessary hassle that ensure that the right students end up in the right classes.
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