UHCL adds new class rotation to schedule

Lynsie Whitehead
The Signal
UHCL has been accustomed to offering courses once a week for three hours at a time. Beginning in the fall, it is going to change. UHCL is adding one-and-a-half-hour courses offered twice a week hour-long sessions three times a week.

At first I thought maybe this would be a good idea; it would give students an opportunity to stay refreshed in the classroom. Once the issue was discussed further, I realized not everyone is in support of this change.

The idea behind the founding of UHCL was to create a university for nontraditional students. A majority of students at the university are full-time employees, parents and commuters.

We can’t just assume because students are incoming freshman and sophomores they will be fresh out of high school. It could be that the new freshman class will be full of older students deciding to further their education.

With the new freshman and sophomore class rotation schedule, will our university still appeal to nontraditional students? Even though there will be students in their first year out of high school, the university needs to consider the nontraditional freshman who may find our one-day-a-week, three-hour course schedule more appealing than the community college schedule option.

Parents often have to find baby sitters to watch their little ones while they are on campus. Finding a baby sitter twice or three times a week isn’t always easy. While we are on the issue of children, classes offered twice or three times a week means more time away from your family. Let’s face it, class isn’t just a matter of being on campus for an hour or an hour and a half. We can’t forget about the drive to campus, parking, the time spent after class and the drive home.

Even if some of the incoming freshmen or sophomores aren’t parents, there is still plenty to object to with the new class rotation. I for one commute almost an hour and half each way to campus. If the new class rotation goes in effect this means students have to spend more time on the road, more money in gas, and even less time to study or work. The same can be said for adjunct professors, who may have an even harder time with the change. They receive less pay than full-time faculty for their time on campus, and they would be spending even more money in gas to get here.

Faculty may have more negative things to say about the issue than students. Many professors are worried that the shortened class time could pose a problem. In a three-hour session professors have an opportunity to go into more depth with their lessons; shorter class times would prevent that.

In opposition, the university may argue that shorter class times would work better with students’ attention spans, and there are times when classes do benefit from being offered twice a week. I would have never been able to pass college algebra at three hours a pop. Twice a week works really well for these types of classes.

The three-times-a-week classes, however, seem potentially insufficient. Professors would not have enough time in one hour to teach an effective lesson, and students may not choose to attend all three days of class each week. Professors would probably agree that the last place students want to be on a Friday is sitting in class. Besides, one-hour classes are actually only 50 minutes, but with students drifting in late and spending the last five minutes packing up, teachers are left with 35 to 40 minutes of quality class time.

The incoming freshman coming straight out of high school may not have an issue with the change; after all, it’s still much better than a high school schedule. Also, traditional students transferring in from a junior college are accustomed to this type of rotation already. But are all of our new freshman and sophomores going to be traditional students? Many of our “traditional” students still work in addition to attending classes.

Perhaps the university should offer a choice of options until evidence of students and faculty preference has had a chance to evolve.

How do you feel about the proposed new class rotation? The Signal wants to hear your voice by responding in the comments.