The only decent course I could find for summer school is psych... seriously, I want to get some courses out of the way; why must there be such a little (in particular, engineering) list to choose from? I know professors do research and whatnot, but if even the professors who's teaching quality is bollocks who teach during the school year are busy being geniouses in anything but educating, why can't there be some sub-par schlub who can read a textbook during a summer course? We're pretty a pretty darn big university, why must we not operate as well during teh summarrrrrr :(

I wanna take 4 courses, f*ck.

It's usually a demand issue, courses that have lots of cores during the year and are pre-reqs for a lot of courses are usually offered, basically everything else isn't offered during the summer because there just wouldn't be enough students to justify the cost.

Originally Posted by Tailsnake

It's usually a demand issue, courses that have lots of cores during the year and are pre-reqs for a lot of courses are usually offered, basically everything else isn't offered during the summer because there just wouldn't be enough students to justify the cost.

For the most part, I agree, but what if a course doesn't have labs ... theres obviously a lot of overhead, but I would think the largest cost would be the professor salary.. theres no way some courses are not 'cost efficient', considering how many people want some of them.

I can't find ANY engineering courses except for the basic ones..

A non-lab course is profitable if at least 60 students sign up.

There really should be a survery or something asking students what courses they wana take this summer and the summer school courses/schedule should be decided based on that...It's really unfair because as Ryan said, a lot of the engineering electives (and all of the core courses past 1st year) aren't offered and our course loads during the year are large enough as it is...

Hey guys,

This was one of the issues that our current president elect campaigned on- there might be enough students who want a course to offer it, but the university doesn't have any way to measure this and thus won't take the risk. Unfortunately its unlikely at this point to be able to get any changes made for this summer's courses, however next summer you might be better off depending on how talks with the university administration go.

I agree with Amy. A simple survey should be easy to handle. It's impossible to get non-third year killer history courses.

1. Are you considering summer school?
2. Approx. how many units
3. Which of these courses would you be interested in taking (maybe incorporating an order of preference?)
4.Why did you list these courses? Elective/Required/etc

You can put in some sort of an algorithm where required selections get bumped up or something.

And then say >80 people are interested in course x (to make sure they hit the 60 mark), offer it.


And there you go. University makes money. TAs and profs make money. Students get units.

I agree, I find the lack of summer courses frustrating.
I had to drop one course this year (due to a family loss - I couldn't handle so much school). I only need ONE course (third year Geography) to complete my degree, and there's not a single third year Geography course offered this summer. So I have to come back for 4 months in September for one course. :(

I completely agree. I can't find any 2nd or even 3rd year bio courses to take. I like the survey idea. Is there a way this can be implemented in the 2011/2012 school year to offer more courses for summer 2012?

Just to expand on the 'university not interested unless garunteed interest' idea, why not require a portion of tuition as a deposit ahead of time? That way if a bunch of students apply then decides not to take the course, the university still breaks even for those individuals?

I had the oppoiste problem. I'm taking four courses and had trouble deciding which ones I wanted because a lot are at the same time. I finally figured it out, and am actually really happy because I'm taking one class that's not offered every year and when it is, it fills up super fast because it's in such high demand. I'm soo excited to take it this summer!

Originally Posted by AmyLia

A non-lab course is profitable if at least 60 students sign up.

Actually many summer courses are taught by sessionals who are paid only ~ $6500-7000 for the course. So a typical summer lecture course is probably break even in the vicinity of 15-20 students.

Originally Posted by britb

I agree with Amy. A simple survey should be easy to handle. It's impossible to get non-third year killer history courses.

1. Are you considering summer school?
2. Approx. how many units
3. Which of these courses would you be interested in taking (maybe incorporating an order of preference?)
4.Why did you list these courses? Elective/Required/etc

You can put in some sort of an algorithm where required selections get bumped up or something.

And then say >80 people are interested in course x (to make sure they hit the 60 mark), offer it.


And there you go. University makes money. TAs and profs make money. Students get units.

I've always wondered why they don't do this for courses during the school year, every year when mugsi opens certain electives fill up immediately and students are forced to take elective courses they're neither interested in or care about because the school failed to properly gauge the level of demand for courses.

Originally Posted by lizziepizzie

I had the oppoiste problem. I'm taking four courses and had trouble deciding which ones I wanted because a lot are at the same time. I finally figured it out, and am actually really happy because I'm taking one class that's not offered every year and when it is, it fills up super fast because it's in such high demand. I'm soo excited to take it this summer!

Thanks for your little story of success, jerkface

ahahahaahah that ^ was so funny

Originally Posted by dsahota

Actually many summer courses are taught by sessionals who are paid only ~ $6500-7000 for the course. So a typical summer lecture course is probably break even in the vicinity of 15-20 students.

I agree with you, and that's probably very true. But what you have to understand, is that the university has no interest in "breaking even". A course has to generate profit in order for them to be interested in running it. It may be a school to you, but at the end day, they look at themselves as a business.

By not asking us what courses we want, and thus us having to fill up the courses they do offer, they never have to worry about not making money.
It's a bad system imo and more people should be bitching about it.