From. The Advisory Council for Comprehensive Academic Advising
To: Provost Keith Miller
Date: October 16, 2003.
Re: Lack of printed Timetables
The Advisory Council for Comprehensive Academic Advising met today. One item that we discussed was the recent decision to cease printing the paper Timetables listing each semester’s course offerings, in favor of an online system.
Various members of the Council have used the online
system and find that it is cumbersome to the point of increasing time-to-task
for course lookups by as much as a factor of 50.
It is also vastly more difficult to cross-check courses in different
departments for schedule conflicts.
Should an advisor wish to print out the online version for easier look-up, course listings consume a great deal more paper than they do in the printed Timetable. For example, 2 pages of Biology course listings grow to 26 pages printed from the online version.
In a nutshell, the (false) economy of online Timetables needlessly complicates the advising process and hurts advisors and students.
As a result of our discussion, the Council voted unanimously to formally recommend an immediate re-institution of printed Timetables or, at the least, the uploading of a printer-friendly version that approximates the format of printed Timetables of our most recent past.
Dana K. Vaughan Ph.D.
Chair, Advisory Council on Comprehensive Academic Advising