Although it did not seem long ago that the summer leaves were falling and turning to autumn colors, winter break is only a few weeks away and this will undoubtedly turn students’ curiosity to the next semester at Siena. Planning for the future can be difficult and stressful, especially for college students. Between assignments and projects every week, it may be difficult to see past this and plan for future academic endeavors due to time constraints and commitments. The past month at Siena, however, has been focused on this because students have been planning for Winter/Spring registration for the 2022 academic year. After students return for winter break in a month and a half, they will be greeted with all new classes. Although choosing these may seem dizzyingly confusing at first, Siena has implemented support for all of its students to succeed during this process.
The first step of registration support began when students met with their Academic Advisor. In these meetings, the advisor could work with students to help build their schedule by discussing classes needed to fill Siena’s core Franciscan course requirements. Additionally, this advice helped students build the courses required to meet the specific requirements for each students’ major. At the end of this meeting, each advisor gave students a pin that would be used to log into the portal to register for classes. These meetings are incredibly important because a specific academic advisor is paired with a student for all four of their years at Siena. They understand the responsibilities and requirements that come with students’ majors and will guide them in fulfilling every course that will be needed to graduate. What would ordinarily be confusing to navigate on one’s own is made easier by the help of a Siena faculty member.
For freshmen at Siena, this was the first time they were involved in the registration process. For those still seeking more guidance, the Student Academic Success and Engagement office offered a multitude of services to get students on the right track. The office held numerous workshops at familiar locations and over Zoom in the weeks leading up to registration that aimed to walk freshmen through everything they would need to know to use the registration software included in Banner Self Service. Additionally, the Student Academic Success and Engagement office provided information on how to arrange schedules correctly and ensure they would not overlap. The office provided personalized, one-on-one meetings where students could create multiple mock schedules, picking the classes that would work best for their schedules.
After this support, from Nov. 8 to Nov. 19 registration at Siena was in full swing. Seniors received the opportunity to register first to ensure they were able to complete all of the classes required to graduate, followed by juniors, sophomores and lastly freshmen. Following this, Senior and Junior registration took place the week of Nov. 8, while Sophomore and Freshman registration took place Nov. 15. An algorithm was developed to generate a system that ensured students’ position in alphabetical order did not solely determine the order they could register in. Within seconds, a student’s schedule for the next semester spanning until the end of the academic year could be generated and viewed.
As the campus grass blooms with frost every morning and snow flurries become a daily occurrence, students’ minds will inevitably drift to the future and what the next semester will hold. Although it may be difficult to say goodbye to a favorite professor or schedule, the Winter/Spring 2022 semester will provide even more opportunities for students to succeed in classes that are uniquely Siena in their learning goals and academic rigor.