• courses,  enrolment,  first year

    don’t walk, run to enrol in FYF courses

    Hello,

    I’m a St. Mikes student looking to enrol in PSY195. I see this message in the enrolment cart: “This section is restricted to two groups of students. Group 1 is given priority access until July 26. There is no course enrolment on July 27. Beginning July 28, Group 2 can enrol in this section. Currently the following groups of students can enrol in this section:

    • All students in year of study 1 in the Faculty of Arts and Science in the Innis College”

    Does this mean that I will not be in the first group, available to enroll on the 20th?

    Thank you


    hi there,

    i am so glad you’re deciding to take a first year foundation seminar, they’re SO great and i wish i could still take them. (btw if you wanted to, you could check out this instagram page all about FYF courses. just puttin it out there, idk i think it’s cool *waves hands dismissively*)

    I Cant Over It GIF by Schitt's Creek

    yes, you are correct. my divine intuition (the timetable) tells me that enrolling in PSY195H1 S will only be available to first year innis students on july 20th. as a first year st. mikes student, you’ll have to wait until the 28th, when the general enrolment period starts. (more specifically, for first year students, that’ll be at 12 pm EDT).

    PSY195 has a really small class size of 25, which is amazing for making friends, but also means it’ll be harder to get into. chances are, it’ll fill up pretty fast like all first year foundations courses, especially if you have to wait until general enrolment. i’d recommend keeping an eye on the availability up until then so you’re aware of the situation when you enrol. however, i doubt it’ll fill up immediately.

    i just thought i’d let you know about another option, too! if you wanted to, you could consider enrolling in the fall semester’s PSY195 instead of the winter semester’s, since this one is available to you on the 20th. the course is being offered in both semesters, and the enrolment restrictions are slightly different:

    PSY195H1 F (fall semester) is open to all first year artsci students on the 20th. PSY195H1 S (winter semester) is only open to first year artsci innis students on the 20th.

    anyways, best of luck in your first year. live laugh love, be Boundless, be yourself, all that jazz.

    brandon moss baseball GIF

    over and out,

    aska

  • choosing,  courses,  new kids

    a user manual on courses that you should, probably, read

    This may be a really stupid question, but could you explain courses (their typing(?) clusters(???)) as well as the course selection process and what needs to be considered? Every time i think i got everything i need to know im hit with new terminology i do not understand ? for context im an incoming (hopefully) part-time student at utm, class of ‘27, planning to transfer out by first year but will pursue an english maj philosoy min creative writing min courseload if transferring doesnt work out


    hi bestie,

    no worries, this is not a stupid question. i see you’re encountering first-year’s overwhelming task of deciphering the online labyrinth of “important-uni-things-you’re-just-expected-to-know”.

    The Simpsons gif. Homer hovers over a big manual book in a room with a hazard sign on the door and high tech monitors. He has a worried expression as he turns the page. He says, “I don't understand anything.”

    the good thing is, courses aren’t as complicated as they seem at first! tbh, i think the problem is that a lot of first years just don’t know where to find the right resources. or, they’re like me and gaslighted themselves into thinking it’s all common sense — what my high school chemistry class used to do before a test. as fun as that is, please don’t do that.

    instructions GIF

    anyways. there are several U of T pages that describe everything you need to know about courses. to begin, i would say your best bet is to read through how to use the artsci calendar. this page explains pretty much all the basics about courses and programs, such as how courses are abbreviated on the website, and what things to keep in mind when choosing courses. among what is outlined on that page, understanding course codes is the foundational thing that i would highlight. for example, ENG110Y1 can be broken down into:

    1. ENG – indicates department, ENG = english.
    2. 110 – indicates level of difficulty. the “100” means a first-year level course, and 200-level courses are recommended to take in second year as they are more difficult. and so forth with 3rd year 300-levels and 4th year 400-levels. while an upper year can take easier courses, it would be hard for a first year to take a 3rd year course.
    3. Y – the “Y” or “H” indicates the credit value. Y = full course, 1.0 credits, and H = half course, 0.5 credits.
    4. 1 – indicates which campus offers this course. 1 = St.George, 3 = UTSC, 5 = UTM

    when choosing your courses, you should take note of prerequisites (courses you need to take before another course), exclusions (courses that are so similar you probably shouldn’t take both), and co-requisites (courses you should take at the same time). if a course has any of these, it will say so on the timetable, degree explorer, and acorn. you should also know that there are four types of classes: lectures, tutorials, practicals, and seminars, explained, again, in “how to use the artsci calendar“. and a side note of personal advice — although you’re a part time student, i would highly recommend making space in your schedule to take first year foundation courses, those were my favourite classes in first year. but the best thing to consider in course selection is to make note of important dates so you don’t miss them (wouldn’t that be silly): such as priority course enrolment for first years, which starts on July 20th.

    now in terms of your question about typing and clusters, i’m not sure what you mean by typing, as “type” is mainly used for program types. meanwhile, clusters are just categories of courses within a program. typically each program will break down its large list of courses into similar-subject categories. for example, your english major seems to have three clusters that you need credits in: 1. “indigenous, post colonial, transnational literatures”, 2. “pre-1800 english literature” and 3. “theory, language, critical methods”.

    see? not so bad.

    Phil Hartman Reaction GIF

    finally, i will leave you with even more resource avenues you can look into if you want to know more. there’s an awesome new student guide to planning and enrolling in your courses, with important dates and how to pay your fees. sid smith also has a simple page on how to enrol in courses. UTM’s 2023 course enrolment workbook is “to be posted soon“, and course enrolment workshops could be helpful for you. then, if you really want to know everything, as you say, you can go down a rabbit hole reading through the artsci’s course planning and course enrolment pages (but i really don’t think you need to).

    best of luck in your plan, i hope it all goes smoothly.

    over and out,

    aska

  • courses,  current student,  forensic science,  wait list

    more waitlist woes…

    If there is a waitlist of 40+ people for an fsc course, do you think it’ll be offered in summer? Its fsc316 and it was only offered once in summer in 2021. FSC minors need it too but they only offer a few spots and the majors and specialists take those:(


    hey there,

    first of all, that’s a friggin cool program! although i must admit i had to look up fsc to realize that it wasn’t french (fsl) but actually FORENSIC SCIENCE  like woah.

    to be honest, i don’t really know, but since this course hasn’t really been offered in previous summers, i wouldn’t bank on it happening this year. i mean sure, it might, but that probably depends on a lot of different factors, and just because a course has a long waitlist doesn’t mean they’ll offer more sessions of it.

    i did do some digging into the fsc minor though, and according to the utm academic calendar, it seems that fsc316 isn’t actually required. i don’t wanna be that guy going ‘ok but do you need that course’, but you might wanna take another look at what exactly is required for your program, in case you could take a different course instead? for example, the utm calendar lists fsc316 as part of list of a bunch of courses, and out of those, you’re supposed to take 0.5 FCEs — so any other half year course on there should do!

    however, if you’ve now developed an emotional attachment to getting into this course — i understand.

    assuming you’re in third year right now, so one possible strat is to try getting into the course in your fourth year, since you’ll have higher priority in course selections. that could get tricky though if the course has other types of priority enrolment for specialists/majors etc, so if you’re hoping to go down this route, i’d recommend emailing your department or the course instructor to ask about their process for this. another potential issue is that this may throw a wrench in some of your fourth year course plans, if fsc316 is a prereq for anything else you’re interested in.

    if you do end up really needing the course, i’d also recommend asking your registrar for tips. for example, 4th year arts and science students at utsg get a special lil dean’s promise that we can invoke to get into mandatory courses that are required to graduate, and although i’m not sure if utm has a similar thing, it doesn’t hurt to ask around and see if there’s anything else you could do.

    best of luck!

    aska

  • courses,  current student,  minor

    a minor issue

    do i have to take every course required for a minor in my first year to be able to declare it?


    hey there,

    probably not. most minors that i know of are open enrolment and only require at least 4.0 FCEs completed by the time you apply. other than that, there are no restrictions on the year that you complete the program courses, as long as you complete them all by the time you graduate. although courses might be 100-level or listed as “first year”, in most cases those are kind of just recommended, not required.

    some exceptions would be the computer science minor, for example, where students in the CMP1 stream would need to complete the required courses in their first year, but even for out of stream students, there isn’t really any restriction on having to complete courses in a certain year, you’d just need to have them ready by the time you apply for POSt.

    you can search up the minors you’re interested in on the artsci calendar or email the department to see if there are other restrictions.

    hope that helps!

    aska

     

  • courses,  current student,  enrollment,  tutorials

    i am confusion

    im so confused should i enroll in lectures or tutorials help please!!


    hi confused (sorry i had to),

    me too. i’m confused too.

    i’m gonna assume you’re starting first year in september (or have otherwise avoided enrolling in any lectures or tutorials this year somehow??) so here’s a quick rundown of how lectures and tutorials,work. lectures (LEC) are the actual “classes” you’ll be attending, while tutorials (TUT) are smaller workshops, Q & As or problem solving sessions. there are also practicals (PRA) which are things like labs for science students.

    you’d have to enroll in everything your course requires, so if a course says it has lectures and tutorials, then yeah, you’d have to enroll in both on acorn. (and yes, they’d both be mandatory, unless the instructor says otherwise.)


    if you’re at utsg you can check the artsci timetable to see if they offer lectures/practicals/tutorials. you can also search up your courses on acorn right now and there’ll be options to add lectures or tutorials if they’re available.

    just as a heads up, i’ve also had some profs who held tutorials at times that were actually different from the ones on acorn, or added optional tutorials outside of class time which you wouldn’t have to enroll on acorn either, but usually the lecture/tutorial schedule follows what’s on acorn.

    hope that helps,

    aska

  • courses,  current student,  full-time,  part-time

    if a course gets ncr’d did you ever really take it

    Hello, I’m an international student taking only 3 credits. I’m not doing great in a course and considering declaring it non-credit. If I am to fail it, will it impact my full-time status?


    hi friend,

    apologies for the late reply! hopefully you’ve gotten some advice on this already, but if not, maybe this can still help.

    if you’re taking exactly 3.0 FCEs this school year, then failing or dropping the course could drop you down to part-time status. so the answer is probably yes, but it depends (gotta love that, i know).


    for example, osap funding requires you to enroll in and pass at least 3.0 FCEs for a school year (search “osap academic progress”) — otherwise, you might be put on probation.

    but depending on who you ask, the criteria mayyyy differ. i mean, what even is ‘full-time’ anyway? it’s possible that funding/programs/employers/whoever else you’re tryna impress could consider an ncr differently, so you might want to ask directly to be sure.

    i would also recommend speaking to your registrar for more info, and for support in your future courses!

    good luck~

    aska

  • courses,  current student,  UTM

    an imposter among us (sorry, i had to)

    Hello! I’m a st george student and just realized a course I’ve been taking online is from the mississauga campus. Does it matter? will the mark count toward my grade do I have to tell anyone about this?


    hey there!

    generally the course would count towards your gpa and degree requirements, as long as it’s not an exclusion for a course that you’ve already taken. exclusions would be marked as extra courses and won’t count towards your gpa or degree.

    you should also double check with your registrar’s office to see if the course would count towards your degree requirements. if you’re hoping to take the course for your program requirements (major, minor, specialist, etc.) then you’d also need to ask your department.

    there’s some more info on taking courses at other colleges on this page, under “Courses in Other Divisions”, but that pretty much covers the main points!

    so rest assured, as long as you have a chat with your registrar to clear things up, it’ll likely be fine… just act natural and channel your inner utm student.

    all the best,

    aska

  • courses,  current student,  programs

    gotta get with the program

    Are only my first 20 credits counted for program requirements? Ahhh its so confusing


    hello there,

    ahhhh indeed.


    according to the artsci calendar, you need at least 20.0 credits to graduate, courses beyond that can still count towards your program requirements.

    you just gotta make sure that your 20.0 (or more) credits satisfy these conditions:

    • at least 13.0 FCEs at the 200+ level
    • at least 6.0 FCEs at the 300+ level
    • at least 10.0 FCEs from the faculty of arts and sciences

    the one thing you might have to be careful about is that if you have over 15.0 FCEs with the same three letter designation in the course code (e.g. ENG, or MAT), only the first 15 will count towards your degree requirements… but technically, maybe they can still count for your program requirements? i guess if you do find yourself in the unique dilemma of having 15+ FCEs with the same three letter code, it’d be best to check with your registrar, just in case!

    hope that helps!

    aska

  • auditing,  courses,  current student

    don’t let your dream (courses) be dreams

    Hey! I found out about a course I’ve been dreaming of way too late. I’m on the wait list, but it’s a small class and i’m like 33rd ? so no chance of me getting in. Is there anything i can do at all to still be able to take it? It’s online and I dont know if emailing a prof or the department would do any good for me.


    hey there,

    ironically, i think i may be answering your question way too late… sorry 🙁 but hope this can still help in some way.

    i think 33rd on the waitlist might be too far down to get the prof to accept you directly over the other students who were also interested, but if the waitlist moves along enough, you could have a good shot. anyhow, it doesn’t hurt to ask. some smaller courses (think <20 students) have actually had surprisingly high drop rates in my experience, so there may still be hope!

    another thing is, you may want to ask the prof about auditing the course. auditing would allow you to attend and participate in lectures and classes, but you wouldn’t get a credit for the course or submit any assignments/evaluations.

    you can audit courses for free as a uoft student, or if you really want to get a nice shiny official Certificate of Attendance™, there would be an auditing fee of usually 40% or more of the course tuition. in any case, this could be a good way to get into the class if you mostly want to attend out of interest, and won’t be able to take the course in later years. heck, you can even audit courses after graduating (if you haven’t had enough school yet…) with permission of the department/instructor, and the auditing fee.

    not all departments/instructors will allow auditing, but the best way to find out if you could audit is just to reach out to the prof directly and ask.

    best of luck,

    aska

  • choosing,  courses,  current student,  prereqs

    course selections is like tetris but more frustrating

    Hello! I was wondering… if we’re supposed to take classes for our enrolled major (second year) but also want to enroll at the end of our second year for another major- how do we balance our course load to take the prerequisites AND our major requirements? Thanks a bunch 🙂


    hey there,

    hope second year is going well~ i’d probably prioritize the courses you need to enter the major you wanna apply for, and then try to fit in the courses/prereqs you need for your current major.

    for most majors, there’s no strict requirement on what year you take your courses in, so you could take some of your 200-level courses next year if needed, and just generally mix and match the different course levels as long as you have the prerequisites.

    you might want to plan everything out on degree explorer to make sure that you’ll have all the prereqs you need for upper year courses. course planning is kind of a pain but there’s also something satisfying when you finally get all of those forty-something coloured blocks to fit in your plan :’)

    hope that helps,

    aska

  • breadth requirements,  courses

    give me a class with no math, stat(s)

    I was scrolling through your blog and I noticed that you recommended a course called DTS300 to someone. It sounds really interesting but I can’t find a lot of people talking about it online. Could you tell me more about it, if that’s okay with you? Thanks ?

    ———————————————

    hi there!

    thank you very much for your patience with this answer — i know it’s been a while!

    sure, i’m happy to tell you more about DTS300 if it’s still relevant. i had to dig up the syllabus to answer this well, which is why the delay. the year i took the class, attendance counted for a chunk of the grade, and then the rest of it was just three short papers and one longer one. the material was very conceptual — rather than delving into statistical techniques or mathematics the way you would in a regular breadth 5 class, we focused more on how quantitative and qualitative research function in the social world. for example, we looked at how statistics bolstered systemic racism against Black people in the united states.

    i personally really enjoyed the readings and the vibe of the class. despite being a fairly large group (i think 200-300 students), the instructor, kevin o’neill, ran things with a very interactive vibe. each lecture had a bit of an argument, in the sense that there was a conceptual realization o’neill wanted us to arrive at by the end. it was an intellectually challenging course, and i found it very worthwhile.

    keep in mind that all this could change, but that’s what DTS300 was like in my experience. i would definitely recommend it as a breadth 5 course!

    i hope this provided some more insight into what you might expect if you choose to take it.

    be Boundless,

    aska

     

  • courses,  writing

    if only i could take every single course u of t offers

    hi! i wanted to ask if you know anything about creative writing courses at u of t. cre275 (formerly known as vic275) sounds really interesting but i’m not sure if it’s gonna be good i know it’s subjective but i guess i wanted to ask if you know anything about it/know ppl who have taken it !

    ———————————————

    hello!

     

    thank you for your patience with this answer — i guess if you were planning to apply to cre275, you’ve already done it, but i’ll answer this anyway.

    i unfortunately haven’t taken cre275, but i do know people who have taken it with kuitenbrouwer and enjoyed it. that kind of assessment is, as you acknowledged, very subjective and my guess is that the course will probably be what you make of it.

    in terms of what i know about creative writing courses at u of t in general, i know that the cre program has some fantastic ones — but so does innis college’s writing and rhetoric program. i’ve taken a class with sharon english, and i would highly recommend anything she teaches. she’s a fantastic instructor who gives incredibly thoughtful feedback. if you’re interested at all in creative non-fiction, simon lewsen’s classes are also really enjoyable.

    sorry i couldn’t be more helpful — there are, after all, limits to what i can speak about from personal experience! but if you want to ask people who have taken cre275 and similar courses, feel free to drop your email and a quick note back in the tumblr ask box, and i can email you the link to a discord server where these kinds of discussions take place.

    be Boundless,

    aska